Team ROOT
by Leonineus
Summary: Danzō knows the Sandaime will never consent to the Kyūbi jinchūriki being placed in his ROOT program, so he takes matters into his own hands, as well as those matters pertaining to a certain newborn Hyūga heiress... NaruHina, powerful!Naruto and Hinata
1. Conscription

Team ROOT

Chapter One: Conscription

**October 11****th**** – 24hrs following the Kyūbi's attack and resulting sealing at the cost of the Yondaime Hokage's life.**

Danzō Shimura was a prudent man. Hence he had, over the years, developed his ability to come up with a plan for any eventuality. Thus, once the Kyūbi had been sealed, he immediately sent a group of his ROOT to get the child and bring him back to the ROOT base.

Hiruzen Sarutobi was not having a good say. Not only had he just lost his successor Minato Namikaze, the Yondaime Hokage, and was therefore being forced to resume his post as the Sandaime Hokage, but the Council were insisting that the child now bestowed with the burden of keeping the Kyūbi no Kitsune contained be executed to ensure that the demon could not rise again. It complicated matters that the newly-appointed jinchūriki was his successor's son, so he could not in good conscience condemn the Yondaime's legacy without spitting in the face of his friend's last wish.

He sighed and ran a hand through his thinning hair. Unable to put it off any longer, he pushed open the door to see a portable crib beside the desk where Naruto, last time he saw him, had been sleeping peacefully. It was empty.

He stared at the empty crib in utter shock for a second before reacting. "KAKASHI!" he roared.

An ANBU in a dog mask appeared, "Yes, Hokage-sama…?"

Sarutobi rounded on him, "Naruto's gone, I want ANBU teams scouring the village for him, NOW!"

Kakashi didn't even bother to acknowledge the order; he just disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

Sarutobi walked over to the crib and looked down into it. He could see the tiny dent on the mattress where Naruto had been sleeping. _"Oh Minato," _he thought sadly, _"I've already failed you and Kushina…"_

-TR-

**December 27****th**** – 24hrs following the birth of Hinata Hyūga.**

Danzō smiled happily to himself as one of his ROOT made a report. It seemed that the Hokage still had no idea that he was behind the disappearance of the infant Kyūbi jinchūriki, and the rumours going around the village that the Kyūbi had taken over its host and fled the village, killing most shinobi as it went made him laugh. He'd like to know how a baby less than a week old could even walk around on its own, let alone kill multiple shinobi to make its escape from the village.

The fact that his kidnap had gone undetected was not the only thing making him happy, however. His ROOT had reported that the Hyūga clan head's wife had just given birth to a baby girl. With Danzō's recent start in baby-napping to supplement his ranks, he saw it as a perfect opportunity to get a Main Branch Hyūga into his ROOT. The fact that it would also provide the Kyūbi jinchūriki with a training partner of the same age (most of his troops were far too old) didn't hurt either. Chuckling to himself, Danzō began to issue his orders.

-TR-

A despairing wail of grief rent the snowy night air in the Hyūga compound, and Main and Branch members alike turned to look towards the main house as the newborn Hinata Hyūga's nursemaid's scream carried through an open and lit window, "HINATA-SAMA! SHE'S GONE! GUARDS, GUARDS!"

The guards, despite using their Byakugan to their fullest extent across the entire compound and most of the village, would find nothing, not even footprints in the snow. They were eventually forced to give up as the frigid December weather brought fresh snow clouds over the village and began burying everything in a sea of white once more.

-TR-

**Three years following the abduction of Hinata Hyūga, late Spring.**

It had now been three years since Danzō abducted the Kyūbi jinchūriki and Hyūga heiress and brought them to his ROOT, and the pair in question were just beginning their training.

First, he decided he needed to carry out a little experiment. Having dispatched some of his stealthiest ROOT to the Hyūga compound to steal the scrolls for the Jyūken (he couldn't have a Hyūga as an asset without her knowing the Jyūken, after all; the very idea was unthinkable), he ordered one of the med-nin to collect the Uzumaki and the Hyūga and bring them to his office.

As soon as the two three-year-olds were seated, looking at each other in confusion, Danzō leaned forwards in his seat and tried to give the pair a paternal smile, "Now, you two are going to be running a little test today. I'm sure you both know rudimentary chakra control already?"

At their nods, Danzō smiled, knowing starting the pair off on chakra control as soon as they could walk unaided was a good idea, "Well today, this little test will be to see if we can boost your," he pointed at Hinata, not bothering with her name, "chakra reserves."

Naruto raised a tiny hand, "How do we do this, jiji?"

If the med-nin standing behind the pair of children hadn't already completed her emotional conditioning, Danzō was sure she would have giggled. As it was, Danzō almost turned red at the informal name but managed to force it down at the last second.

"Young man," he said, not bothering with Naruto's name either, "You must address me as Danzō-sama, is that clear?"

Naruto stuck out his lower lip and looked slightly sulky, "Fine, Danzō-_jii-sama_."

Hinata giggled, but schooled her features into an emotionless mask when Danzō looked at her. The bandaged man took a deep breath before continuing, "Anyway, this experiment we will be running will be to see if we can make her," he pointed at Hinata, "have reserves of the same volume as you," he pointed at Naruto, "Any questions?"

Naruto raised a hand, "What will we have to do?"

Danzō smiled; the boy was already following orders like a good shinobi, "You and the girl need to bite each other on the shoulder and channel some chakra in."

He was banking on the boy having bad enough control to channel a large amount of chakra into the girl for the experiment, so he discreetly crossed his fingers as the pair of them pulled their shirt collars down over their right shoulders and moved closer.

The med-nin watched impassively as this occurred.

Each of them was slightly apprehensive, but at Danzō's encouraging looks they each took a breath and moved closer.

Almost in sync each bit down on the other's shoulder and channelled chakra through their teeth.

Danzō watched in satisfaction as he saw a mark form on each of their left shoulders. It seemed his plan was working, which of course it was always going to. He had had three years to make his plans work, after all.

The mark Hinata left resembled a crescent moon with a small Yin-Yang inside the shape at each tip so that it touched both sides of the shape. The mark Naruto left resembled a spiral made of nine fox-tails.

The pair separated, blushing slightly and wincing as they felt the bite marks in their shoulders smarting slightly… before both suddenly screamed in pain and fell to the ground.

Danzō simply clicked his fingers and pointed at the med-nin, "Take them to the medical bay and keep watch over them. Call me on the intercom if their condition takes a turn for the worse."

The woman bowed before bending down, gripping both (now unconscious) children by the shoulders and disappearing in a shunshin.

-TR-

Naruto came around to find himself lying in a bed.

Looking around blearily, he found that his senses were oddly sharper than usual. He could see even the smallest cracks on the ceiling, smell the sterile smell of what he guessed to be the hospital area of the underground base, hear faint footsteps outside the closed door and feel the scratchy sheets. Something twitched against his leg and he jumped, sitting upright at top speed and pulling the blankets back. His eyes widened when he saw what had touched him. It was a tail; an honest-to-Kami _tail_ of the fox variety. The main part of the tail was orange, but the tip was pure black. A soft sound outside the door drew his attention, then he caught sight of his reflection in the mirror above his nightstand. His jaw dropped and his hands flew to the sides of his head.

His ears were gone. A second later he realized that they weren't really gone; they'd just changed position… and species. A pair of orange, black-tipped fox ears sat on top of his head poking through his hair, twitching and turning in the direction of odd sounds from time to time.

A sound from the next bed made him turn to look, before he saw his reflection with its ears perked up and sniggered at how weird it looked.

A figure he now realized to be Hinata rolled over and sat up, blinking sleepily. Naruto's jaw hit the ground with a dull crunch of bone on stone as he saw similar changes on his friend, except her ears and tail were the same colour as her hair except for the tips of both (or all three, depending on how you looked at it), which were purest white.

They stared at each other for a full minute, each taking in the other's changes, before Hinata screamed, "KAWAII!" and glomped him.

The blond yelped with surprise and fell backwards as his friend leapt on him and hugged him tightly, before she caught sight of herself in a mirror and rose to stare.

"Yeah," said Naruto from under her, "Me too."

Hinata opened her mouth to speak, but at that moment the door opened and Danzō entered, followed by the female med-nin. Naruto and Hinata leapt off the bed and stood side-by-side, looking at the floor.

Danzō's single visible eye widened slightly at the physical alterations before he gave them a small smile, "You two seem to have recovered well. Follow me. Your training begins now."

Naruto and Hinata took a few steps forwards and almost fell over.

Danzō turned back towards them as they struggled upright and took a few shaky steps to steady themselves. Only now did he realize that the pair seemed to have gained a few inches as well. He shook his head, "Never mind. Give them a full physical. I want to know everything about their changes since the experiment."

The med-nin nodded and walked over to Naruto, gripping his arms as she lifted him back onto the bed and helped him strip down to his pants. Danzō left, as he needed to go to the training area and find a pair of his ROOT who could train the pair.

-TR-

It transpired that it wasn't only ears, tails, enhanced senses and slight increases in height that Naruto and Hinata had experienced. Both were slightly more muscular (for three-year-olds) as well. They also later discovered, after Naruto was knocked unconscious during a training exercise, that Kyūbi was awake and grouchy.

Danzō had immediately taken Naruto into his office for the rest of the day and interrogated Kyūbi about everything he could think of. Finally Kyūbi had lost his temper and told Danzō the full story of how he had come to attack Konoha from the very beginning, back during the battle between Hashirama Senju and Madara Uchiha. Danzō had found the whole story very interesting, and when the Kyūbi retreated back behind the seal, Danzō already had not only a plan to deal with the Uchiha clan in mind, but also a plan for Kyūbi. With that in mind, he sent one of his ROOT, a man talented in worming his way into even the best fūinjutsu, to see what he could do about loosening Naruto's seal to allow more of Kyūbi's chakra to leak out.

Meanwhile, he headed off to talk to the Council about what he had learned on the Uchiha.

-TR-

Naruto woke up lying in bed. _**"Nice to see you're up!" **_said a voice inside his head just as he was taking a drink of water, causing him to jump so badly he dropped his glass of water.

"_Who… who's there?" _he thought, looking around to find nobody else in the room.

"_**I'm not in the room kid; I'm inside your own head. I must say it's quite comfortable in here; roomy, even."**_

"_Who are you?"_

"_**Heh, you may be three but you're pretty smart aren't you? The name's Kyūbi, kid. Kyūbi no Kitsune, at your service, just your friendly neighbourhood demon sealed in your gut by the Yondaime Hokage to prevent me from getting out and razing your entire village to the ground!"**_

Naruto frowned,_ "The… Kyūbi?"_

"_**Yup, that's me! Overlord of all demons, mightiest of the bijuu, able to fell mountains and create tsunamis with but a single sweep of my tails!"**_

There was only dead silence as his response. Kyūbi sighed, _**"Kid's terms, I'm a big scary monster."**_

"…_Right. So… why are you in my head again?"_

"_**Your Yondaime Hokage sealed me in here to make sure I couldn't get out and destroy your village."**_

"_Destroy is a bad thing, right?"_

"_**Yes…" **_Kyūbi's voice was resigned, _**"It's a very bad thing."**_

Naruto's face was guileless as he spoke to the demonic entity like he'd just made a new friend, _"Okay. So what do we do now?"_

Kyūbi's answering chuckle was dark and mysterious, _**"You will begin learning to utilize my chakra. That bandaged man, Danzō, he will teach you and your little friend the ways of the ninja. Listen to what he has to say and grow strong."**_

Naruto pumped a tiny fist into the air, _"I will! I'll grow strong so I can protect Hinata-chan, dattebayo!"_

There was a pause before Kyūbi spoke again in a wry voice, _**"If there was any doubt in my mind before, I'm sure you are definitely her son now."**_

Naruto didn't hear him, so childishly confident he was in his ability to become a strong ninja, as he ran to find Hinata and tell her about the new friend he'd made.

-TR-

**Five years later.**

When he had first had the Kyūbi-child and the Hyūga heiress abducted into ROOT, Danzō reflected, it had seemed like a most excellent idea. They had seemed like a perfect team from the start; they'd established a rapport with each other in their early years, and were almost constantly close even before he had run the experiment on them marking each other. Afterwards, they were inseparable, even to the extent where a six-year-old Naruto had refused point-blank to go on one of his missions unless Hinata was allowed to come with him. Danzō had relented because he already knew from experience how irritatingly stubborn the Kyūbi's jinchūriki could get when he wanted something that Danzō was unwilling to consent to, and no amount of emotional conditioning on either of them was able to alter the fact that their ultimate loyalties lay not to Danzō, but to each other.

Eventually he had given up trying to separate them (the one time he _did _force them to be apart, he discovered that if they moved more than fifty feet apart they both passed out. He had coaxed the Kyūbi forth into Naruto's body and questioned it about the odd occurrence, at which point Kyūbi explained the first in a long line of follies concerning the duo.

When he had the two children mark each other, Kyūbi explained, Danzō had unwittingly caused them to forge a demonic mate-bound between them. These mate-bonds were very different from normal human bonds, since they tied the two demons together for eternity. Since Naruto and Hinata were now more hanyō than human (the second in Danzō's list of follies, incidentally), the bond could not be broken save by death. That revelation was partly what had fuelled Danzō's recent decision to have them undergo the final stage of emotional conditioning. They would be pitted against each other in a fight to the death, with the trauma of having killed the person they were closest to hopefully erasing the last emotions from the survivor.

The old man had no possible way of knowing that in pitting two of his "pawns" against each other, he inadvertently gave himself a proverbial shot in the foot.

-TR-

Naruto and Hinata walked into Danzō's study, each kitted out in their standard gear.

Naruto wore a black and grey ensemble comprising a grey shirt with a low neckline over a mesh shirt, black trousers and grey arm-warmers. On his back was a pair of twin wakizashi, one hilt protruding over each shoulder; there were shuriken and kunai holsters strapped onto each leg and the hilt of a combat knife protruded from the outside of his right boot. A white mask, stylized into the visage of a demonic fox with the kanji for ROOT on the forehead next to a Leaf insignia, hung from his belt.

He had long since grown his hair out long so that it hung down like a golden mane around his head. If anybody were to look at him from behind, they probably would have mistaken him for a young Yondaime Hokage except for his tail and ears. His blue eyes were serious, befitting the fact that he was on the job; off the job he was one of the liveliest people in ROOT (not saying much, considering they were mostly emotionless husks except for Hinata and to a lesser extent, Sai). After his first successful mission, Danzō had given him the codename Yōkō. (Demon Fox)

Hinata, at his side, looked pretty much the same. She wore a similar black and grey set of tight clothing, but there were slight differences; her neckline was a little higher than Naruto's, but her mesh undershirt was still visible; her grey top had no sleeves in contrast to the short sleeves on Naruto's, she had a senbon holder strapped to each thigh along with the kunai and shuriken holders, she wore a pair of tipless tantō knives on her back the same way Naruto wore his wakizashi and the mask that hung from her belt was stylized to resemble an angel's face, befitting her own codename of Tenshi. (Angel)

She, like Naruto, had grown her hair out over the past five years, it now hung down her back in a wave of indigo reminiscent of a certain purple-haired female ANBU in a cat mask, save for two bangs framing her face. Her pale lavender eyes had the same serious expression as Naruto's. Her ears still poked up through her hair, occasionally shifting when a soft sound drew her attention, and her tail swished gently behind her.

To Danzō, they were simply tools to be used and cast away when they broke, but to anybody else who could read body language, the way they stood told a better tale. The pair weren't just a team. They were partners, fully used to working together to complete their mission, and Danzō knew that despite his opinions that emotions made a shinobi weak, the pair comprising Naruto Uzumaki and Hinata Hyūga was undoubtedly the best he'd ever trained in all his long years of running ROOT.

"You wanted to see us, Danzō-jii-sama?" said Naruto, his deadpan voice making the epithet seem just that little bit more humiliating. Danzō winced slightly before steeling himself and saying, "You two have done very well. I feel it is time for you to complete your training. You will face each other in a battle to the death. This is non-negotiable, and you will obey."

The pair of ROOT in front of Danzō simply cast each other a look, causing a feeling of irritation to pass through the man. The pair were no doubt conversing using the third thing they had got from the mate marking he had had them perform half a decade ago; a form of telepathy which really consisted of Kyūbi exploiting the unique connection created by his chakra to relay messages between them.

"_I think it's time to put our plan into action, Hinata-chan."_

"_I think so too, Naruto-kun. Let's do it."_

Naruto smirked, "Sorry, Danzō-jii-sama, but we decline. We'd also like to tender our resignations from ROOT." He and Hinata both opened their mouths. Danzō's single visible eyebrow rose at the action, then his single visible eye actually opened wide as he saw the juinjutsu on their tongues suddenly illuminated by red chakra. Half a second later, orange cracks spread across the bars of the juinjutsu, looking like lava cracking rock blocking its exit from a volcano, before the juinjutsus on both their tongues suddenly shattered and vanished.

Naruto worked his tongue in and out of his mouth briefly before he said in a slightly muffled voice, "Ouch; that hurt."

Danzō's single eye narrowed, not that it was all that perceptible considering what it usually looked like, "Am I to understand then, that you are both turning on me?"

Naruto didn't respond with words; the vulgar hand gesture he made was more than ample to get his point across.

Danzō pressed the button on the intercom, "Attention all ROOT. The fox has gone feral and the angel has fallen. I want them detained ASAP."

Naruto reached for his combat knife, but almost immediately felt a dozen sharp objects pressing against his back. Slowly lowering his right leg and raising his hands to the top of his head, he turned his head slightly and caught Hinata's eye through the eyeholes of her mask. He gave an almost imperceptible nod, and Hinata responded with one of her own before pretending to raise her hands to the back of her head.

"Hakkeshō Kaiten!" (Eight Trigrams Palm Heavenly Spin)

Naruto suddenly ducked and threw himself to the right out of the way as Hinata suddenly spun on the spot, a dome of chakra exploding into being all around her and flinging all the ROOT shinobi holding the two at bay backwards into walls, the ceiling and the floor.

Naruto rolled to a stop and leapt up as Danzō rose from his chair, "Kanashibari no Jutsu!" (Temporary Paralysis Jutsu)

Danzō went rigid.

Naruto then bent down and began inspecting the groaning ROOT shinobi on the floor. Finally locating one with an image of an odd, three-pronged weapon carved into his mask, he jabbed a pressure point in the shinobi's neck and caused him to go limp. Heaving the boy onto his shoulder, Naruto nodded to Hinata, who sent the door careening off its hinges with a powerful blow. She then ran through the gap with Naruto close behind carrying the limp body.

They quickly found their escape route blocked with ROOT shinobi. The pair shared a glance and nodded again before Naruto threw the limp body to Hinata, who caught it. Naruto then spun on the spot and stood with one hand held out towards each thicket of shinobi, "Fūton: Daitoppa!" (Wind Release: Great Breakthrough)

The ROOT shinobi at both ends of the corridor were flung straight off their feet, allowing Naruto to retrieve their charge from Hinata and both of them to sprint off down the corridor.

As they sped through the tunnels around the base, Hinata in front and dropping anyone they encountered with powerful Jyūken strikes to the abdomen and Naruto following behind her, Naruto was relaying directions to Hinata via the mental map of the base he had created for them since they had joined ROOT.

A kunai zipped past Naruto's ear. Ducking and turning his head, he adopted a one-handed tiger seal and silently thanked anyone watching that he could perform this particular jutsu with only one hand free, "Suiton: Teppōdama!" (Water Release: Gunshot)

A ball of condensed water flew from his open mouth and hit the ROOT shinobi who had thrown the kunai squarely in the chest, hurling him backwards into his companions like a bowling ball.

"_Naruto-kun," _Hinata's voice sounded inside his head, _"We forgot the door is solid steel. We can't break through!"_

"_Maybe you can't," _replied Naruto, _"But I can. Catch!" _He threw the unconscious shinobi to her and took the lead as she dropped back behind him, flashing through seals: "Fūton: Ni Kaze no Yaiba!" (Wind Release: Double Wind Blades)

The air rippled as the two blades flew from Naruto's hands and hit the door in an X-shape, carving two deep grooves into the metal. Light could be seen through the tiny gaps as Naruto adopted another tiger seal, "Fūton: Renkūdan!" (Wind Release: Drilling Air Bullet)

The bullet flew from his mouth and hit the door perfectly at the point where the two gashes intersected, blasting a large hole straight through the metal with the resulting explosion.

Naruto retrieved their package from Hinata and leapt through the gap, Hinata close behind him.

Danzō, who was leading the charge behind them and showing remarkable agility for an old man, saw Naruto turn and wave before both of them disappeared with shunshin.

-TR-

Naruto and Hinata landed in one of their hideouts they had built in various parts of the village and took deep breaths. They had used a fair amount of chakra during their escape; not enough to really faze either of them but definitely enough that they both felt the effects, however slight they may be.

Naruto propped their captive against the wall and tugged off his mask, revealing it to be Sai. His eyes were closed and he looked a little bruised from what Naruto knew to have been an impact with first the ceiling due to Hinata's Kaiten and then the floor thanks to gravity.

Hinata jabbed him in the jaw, disabling his jaw muscles so Naruto could get into his mouth and press two fingers to the boy's tongue. A glow of red chakra appeared around his fingers and then the juinjutsu broke.

Hinata tapped his jaw again to re-enable his jaw muscles and Naruto snapped some smelling salts under the boy's nose.

Sai opened his eyes, his nose screwing up as it tried to escape the sharp smell, "Where are we?"

Naruto smirked, pushing his mask up to reveal his face, "In one of our hideouts around the village. We busted out after Danzō tried to make us kill each other."

Sai frowned, "I was under the impression all three of us were under the effects of Danzō-sama's juinjutsu. How did you break it?"

Naruto smirked, "That thing? That never worked on us, we just kept it around so Danzō wouldn't try and put it on again; it hurt like shit being put on the first time."

Hinata swiped him across the back of the head, "Language, Naruto-kun."

Sai looked puzzled, or as puzzled as a guy with almost no emotion left in his body can get, "Then why am I here?"

Naruto smiled, "We're friends, Sai. Friends don't leave friends behind in the lions' den, even if we did kinda throw you into the ceiling first."

Sai said nothing; he simply ran a hand over his bruised face. Hinata crouched next to him with one of her special balms and tugged his hand away so she could start working on healing him.

"So what happens now?"

Naruto walked over to a small window and peered through the dirty glass to look outside. It looked like nobody was in the vicinity. "We go to the Hokage and tell him we'd like to join the current Academy class. I think ROOT isn't really the place for the three of us any more."

Hinata stood up and pocketed the small container of balm before pulling Sai upright. "Masks on, we'll try and get in to see the Hokage by saying we're ANBU."

The other two nodded, deferring to Naruto as their informal leader. It wasn't just that he was the tallest out of the three of them; Hinata was about the same size. No, it was the fact that Danzō had once referred to Naruto as a born leader who might be worthy to take his place one day. Every member of ROOT had heard it and made a mental note never to piss off the boss's favourite.

Donning their masks, they left the hideout exactly the way they had entered it; leaving no trace that they had ever been there.

-TR-

Sarutobi was working his way through a stack of documents when three masked ANBU entered through the door. He spared them a glance and compared their individual masks to his mental roster of the current ANBU on duty and on missions and came up with nothing, so he sat back in his chair and said, "Hello. Are you three here for your first mission as ANBU?"

Naruto, who was standing in the middle with Hinata on his right and Sai on his left, chuckled, "Oh, we're not with ANBU. We're ROOT, or were."

Sarutobi looked up at the mention of the organization he'd assumed was dead, "ROOT is still running? Hang on, how are you talking about it?"

Naruto frowned, "I know you probably haven't seen me since the day I was born, Hokage-sama, but seriously I thought you'd recognize me!"

The masked female on the right of the masked man turned to look at him, "Naruto-kun, you still have your mask on."

Sarutobi's eyes widened slightly at the mention of the name Naruto. Leaning forwards he looked at the male in the middle, "Naruto? Naruto… Uzumaki?"

The man shrugged, "Beats me. Danzō-jii-san only told me my name was Naruto or he called me Yōkō, he never mentioned my last name…"

He reached up and took off his mask, and Sarutobi's jaw dropped. The boy in front of him looked like a slightly younger Minato Namikaze, except for the tail and ears.

"Kami blessed," he whispered, "Naruto…"

Standing up quickly, he moved around the desk and embraced the young man, "I was worried about you for so long after you disappeared!"

Naruto shrugged, "Well I'm safe now."

Sarutobi nodded, "Who are your friends?"

Naruto stepped back and gestured to Hinata, "This is my partner in ROOT, Hinata."

Hinata took off her mask and bowed to the Hokage.

At the sight of another person returned from the dead he gasped, "Hinata Hyūga!"

Hinata smiled, "An honour, Hokage-sama."

Sarutobi sat back on his desk in shock. One of the piles of paperwork fell over, but he paid it no mind. "You two were presumed dead years ago. Hinata's family were devastated when she disappeared."

Suddenly he pointed at Sai, "And you are?"

Sai removed his mask and hung it on his belt as the others had done, "My codename is Sai. I do not have a real name."

Sarutobi simply nodded, returning to his chair, "Would you three mind telling me all that you know of ROOT and what you've been up to for the last few years."

Naruto nodded, "Of course."

Sarutobi leaned over and pressed a button on the intercom on his desk, "Can you get me a notepad and pen? And a couple of bottles of sake, I think I may need them."

The voice came back with an affirmative and Sarutobi turned to Naruto, "So, how did you two get these ears and tails?"

Naruto started to explain, "It was an experiment by Danzō-jii-sama to see if he could make Hinata as powerful as me by having us mark each other."

Sarutobi picked up on one word, "Mark?"

Naruto and Hinata pushed their shirts off their left shoulders to reveal the marks.

Sarutobi inspected them closely while Naruto explained, "Kyūbi, and yes I know of him, says that they're mate marks demons usually use to lay claim to a female and vice versa. When I bit Hinata-chan and channelled some of my chakra into her, the yōki mixed in with it made the mark and since I didn't have that great chakra control, I ended up channelling a rather large amount in, which Kyūbi then used to mess with her body so that it could safely accommodate about a tail's worth of yōki or so, which will renew itself every time she uses some up. I'm about nine times stronger than she is, but she's really tough on her own."

Sarutobi frowned, skating over the borderline-illegal experiment Danzō had performed for the moment, "So how did she manage to mark you if she's purely human?"

Naruto shrugged, "We don't know. Kyūbi came up with a theory that his yōki flooded her entire body before she could channel her own chakra into my bite, so she ended up accidentally channelling Kyūbi's own yōki back into me, thus making her own mate mark."

Sarutobi's secretary entered at that moment, casting the trio a curious look as she set a tray of sake bottles and a few saucers down on the desk before handing the Hokage the notepad and pen and departing the room.

Naruto reached for one of the sake saucers, only for the Hokage to tap him sharply on the back of the hand with his pen. Naruto froze and looked up, "Please? I'm thirsty from our escape from the ROOT base and haven't had a drink in about four hours."

Sarutobi leaned over, "You're eight."

Naruto gave him a sardonic look, "Hokage-sama, me and Hinata killed our first enemy shinobi at four years old. We massacred an entire village of Tsuchi no Kuni villagers that were building weapons for Iwa at six, and I still lie awake at night remembering the terrified faces of five women I was forced to kill just because they had the misfortune to be moving crates of newly-made kunai when I entered the room. Do you really think we're both still on the eight-year-old maturity level? You grow up fast in ROOT."

Sarutobi finally removed the pen, allowing Naruto to collect four saucers and one bottle of sake. He poured one for each of them and passed them out before leaning back in his chair with his own saucer, "Well, I guess my earliest memory would have to be…"

**(A/N: Well, what do you think? It is a little idea I had for after Both Sides of the Kunai reaches its conclusion. This story will never truly be able to contend with the majesty that is Kenchi618's story The Sealed Kunai in my opinion, but that sure as hell isn't going to stop me trying! Anyway, tell me what you think in a review; love it, hate it, whatever. Catch ya later!)**


	2. The Academy

Team ROOT

Chapter Two: The Academy

Naruto, Hinata and Sai stood in front of their new home. Sarutobi had authorized three apartments in the top floor of a block of flats to be knocked through to make one big apartment.

Three of the bedrooms were obviously going to be just that, while two more would be knocked together to form a large gym. They couldn't use jutsu in there for obvious reasons, but it was perfect for working out or practicing their taijutsu.

As thanks for giving him all the information about Danzō's operations that they had, Sarutobi had given them a fair quantity of cash in return as partial restitution for it. They had only spent half of that on their new home; the rest was going to be stored away as their fund for restocking on weaponry and such.

This fund was going to be supplied by their missions once they made genin, and until then they were going to be on the orphan's stipend. When asked, Hinata had made it clear that she was unsure the Hyūga would welcome her back, and she wasn't sure she wanted to go back anyway because she didn't know anybody in the clan; Naruto being the only family or closest to it she had ever known.

Naruto dropped onto their new settee and sighed deeply. He, Hinata and Sai had been furnishing their new home for the last three days; carrying heavy items up several flights of stairs had proved exhausting even for Naruto's prodigious stamina.

At one point during the day, they had discovered they could not get the settee he was currently laying on upstairs by conventional means. As such, after obtaining the landlord's permission, they had dug out the putty holding one of the plate glass windows in position and removed the pane before going back downstairs to get their new settee.

Numerous shinobi who lived on the floors below had been mystified by something large blocking the light from their windows for a few seconds, but when they looked out the window they were rendered even more stunned by what they found to be the source of the light blockage.

It wasn't the fact that the settee was being carried by two children who looked like they hadn't attended the Academy yet and were walking up a sheer wall as though it was a flat street that stunned the watching shinobi, nor was it the fact that the pair even had the chakra control to compensate for the weight of the settee. No, what stunned the shinobi observing the action was the fact that they too had had problems getting furniture up to their apartments; but never had it occurred to any of them to simply carry it up the _outside_ of the building and bring it in through an open window. The entire building reverberated with the multitude of shinobi face-faulting on the floor of their apartments.

-TR-

Naruto sighed and closed his eyes, trying to get a little bit of shuteye before they headed out for dinner. A knock at the door put paid to that plan, and as Sai went to answer it Naruto sighed and sat up.

It turned out to have been the Hokage at the door, come to see how they were settling in. "Hokage-sama?" said Naruto, "What are you doing here?"

Sarutobi smiled, "Would you three care to explain why I've had about a dozen of the jōnin living in this apartment complex in my office each begging me to let them take you three on as their genin team when you graduate from the Academy?"

Naruto scratched his cheek sheepishly, "Yeah, we had to carry this settee up the side of the building since it wouldn't fit through the front door. I think they might have seen us."

Sarutobi nodded before smiling and asking, "Would you three like to come out with me to get something to eat?"

Naruto smiled, "Of course! Where?"

Sarutobi chuckled, "Ichiraku Ramen sound alright?"

Naruto beamed, "That sounds great!"

-TR-

High above Konohagakure, Kami allowed herself a deep sigh of relief. Ever since the day Danzō had kidnapped the boy, she had been constantly worried that he would never get the addiction which made him who he was.

Turning around, she watched with a certain amount of satisfaction as the rip in the time-space continuum that had been hanging around for the last eight years snapped shut. Smiling as she turned back to the screen, she settled in to watch the exploits of her favourite eight-year old once more.

Who knew that a ramen addiction could have such an effect on the fabric of reality?

-TR-

They moved down the main street of Konoha, the three children looking around curiously. None of them had really seen much of the Leaf Village before, only seeing some of the more obvious things when running to and from the ROOT base for missions. Danzō was so paranoid about security that he even had his ROOT soldiers sleep in the base.

Eventually Sarutobi stopped outside a shack and pushed back the drapes, "Teuchi-san! I have brought guests!"

The three eight-year-olds saw a man standing in front of them who looked to be in his late thirties. He smiled at them, "Nice to meet you three. I'm Teuchi Ichiraku."

Naruto smiled, "Naruto Uzumaki. And these are my friends, Hinata Hyūga and Sai. It is nice to meet you, Teuchi-san."

Teuchi smiled, turning towards the back room, "Ayame!"

A girl of perhaps thirteen walked out of the back and smiled at them, "Hello."

Naruto nodded to her as he took a seat, Hinata sitting in the chair on his right side while Sai sat to her right. The Hokage took the seat on Naruto's left.

Naruto opted for the miso ramen when Ayame asked, while Hinata went for the seafood ramen and Sai went with a pork ramen.

-TR-

They returned to their new home a few hours later, all of them stuffed to the gills with ramen, and collapsed into bed without doing more than brushing their teeth and changing into nightclothes.

Just before Naruto and Hinata fell asleep he remarked through their mental link, _"We start the Academy tomorrow. It'll be interesting to see how far ahead of everybody else we actually are."_

Hinata's response had a sleepy note to it as she started to drift off, _"I know. I'm quite interested too. Maybe we should have asked the Hokage if he could provide us with files on the different students…"_

"_It would have made no difference. From what I remember Danzō telling us, the Academy works like this; the first year at the Academy, sixty-four children are in two classes of thirty-two. The quarter that score worst on the final exam at the end of the year are dropped from the programme, and the other forty-eight advance. The next year, the same thing happens and thirty-six move on. At the end of the third year, another quarter of the students are dropped and the final twenty-seven are sorted into genin teams."_

"_I recall him also mentioning that only a third of those teams actually become genin," _Hinata pointed out, _"Apparently the final genin exam set by the jōnin-sensei has a sixty-six-percent rate of failure."_

"_Well then, we'll just have to make sure that we're part of those nine genin, won't we? Us and Sai."_

"_Indeed. Goodnight, Naruto-kun."_

"_Goodnight, Hinata-chan."_

Naruto rolled over and curled up under his blankets. Who knew what tomorrow would bring…

-TR-

Naruto, Hinata and Sai stood outside the Academy the next morning waiting for the day to begin. Finally a teacher emerged and walked over to them, "Hello, my name is Iruka Umino. I assume you are Naruto Uzumaki, Hinata Hyūga and Sai?"

Naruto nodded, "That's us."

Iruka cast them an appraising glance, "Pardon me, but you three look more like ANBU than genin."

It was true; with the exception of their masks each of them was wearing their regular ROOT outfits and equipment. Naruto smirked, "How _were_ you expecting us to dress?"

Iruka frowned, "You'll see when we get into the class."

The three ex-ROOT operatives followed the scar-nosed chūnin along a corridor to a classroom, where he pushed back the door and entered. A sea of small faces met them. Their eyes seemed to be fixed on Naruto and Hinata more than on Sai.

One girl with dark purple hair finally stood up and pointed at them, "What's with the stupid ears and tails? You both look like freaks!"

Naruto gave her a smile which _looked _pleasant, but which could've been correctly identified by even an _amateur _reader of body language as extremely insulting, "These are the product of an experiment that was performed on both of us, little girl."

The girl snorted, "Then that must be why you're here. You two were a failed experiment, so they ditched you in here to see if you sink or swim as ninja. My money's on sink, personally."

"Ami!" said Iruka angrily, "Don't be so rude to your classmates!"

Naruto smirked, reached up and gripped the hilts of his twin wakizashi. A second later there was a soft ringing sound of metal and the two weapons flew through the air and sank into the desktop on either side of Ami's hand that rested there. She looked down, her eyes wide with shock.

Naruto moved forwards in a swift shunshin and yanked them back out before sheathing both, "Don't play with fire, Ami-_chan_, you'll only get burned."

Ami stammered, obviously searching frantically for a response that was not forthcoming.

Once Naruto had returned to his position beside Hinata, he said, "My name is Naruto Uzumaki. This is my girlfriend, Hinata Hyūga and our other friend, Sai. Don't mess with us and we won't mess with you, but if you do anything to Hinata at any point when I am absent that she doesn't like, I will fuck you up. And believe me, it isn't a question of whether or not I'll know about what you did, it's a question of how long you have to live until I fuck you up for it."

"Naruto, language!" said Iruka.

"Just trying to get a point across sensei. I'm fine now."

Iruka sighed and ran a hand over his face, "Alright then, take a seat somewhere."

Once the trio had taken seats at one side of the room, he said, "Alright then, over the next four years the lot of you will be taught the ways of shinobi. Each year the quarter of your year that fails the final exam will be dropped and the rest of you will progress."

Naruto and Hinata exchanged a single look before Naruto laid his head down on his arms and closed his eyes.

-TR-

Their afternoon break came quickly, and the three of them sat down in a corner of the yard to eat their lunch. As Naruto was finishing his lunch, a shadow fell across them and they looked up to see Iruka.

"Naruto," he said quietly, "I had a look at your files before you started here and they seemed… incomplete. There was nothing that would hint at how you three got these abilities of yours, no trace of any specialized training or even a cover-up by the Hokage. I was hoping you would be able to shed some light on it."

Naruto and Hinata looked at each other, and Iruka had the oddest feeling that they were having some kind of nonverbal conversation.

Finally Hinata flashed through a few hand seals and the air around them rippled slightly. Iruka recognized it as a genjutsu being erected before Naruto spoke, "What we are about to tell you is an S-ranked secret. If you tell anybody without the permission of either us or the Hokage, there will be hell to pay, am I understood?"

Iruka, startled at the sudden change in Naruto's attitude, nodded.

Naruto took a bite out of his apple before saying, "It all began back during the Second Great Shinobi War, when Tobirama Senju sacrificed himself so that his team could escape the foes that were overwhelming them. Before he did so, he passed on his title of Hokage to one of his three students, Hiruzen Sarutobi. The other student, who showed promise enough for the title was named Danzō Shimura, and he did not like that he had been passed over for it. Thus once the war was over, he formed an elite branch of the ANBU called ROOT."

Iruka opened his mouth, but Naruto silenced him with an upraised hand, "At first, the ROOT were well-known to the Hokage and the ninja corps… they were the elite. Even more elite than the ANBU. But when Minato Namikaze took up the Hokage's hat, he inspected the ROOT and ordered them to close down for inhuman practices such as seal experimentation, emotional conditioning which consisted of being beaten until their emotions were repressed by the trauma and finally being forced to kill their best friend, the person they had grown up with in ROOT."

Iruka covered his mouth, only now noticing how close Naruto and Hinata were sitting. Connections began to be forged in his mind as Naruto continued, "Danzō seemed to obey the Yondaime's orders, but in reality ROOT kept going, working in the shadows, taking all the terrible and distasteful missions that the regular ANBU would not do."

He took another bite out of his apple before continuing, "Now we skip forwards in time, to the night of October the tenth, eight years ago."

Iruka stiffened, that was the night of the Kyūbi attack. He stayed quiet as Naruto continued to speak, "The Kyūbi no Kitsune attacked Konoha, and after a lengthy battle the Yondaime was forced to seal the Kyūbi into an orphan to restrain it. That orphan was myself."

Hinata slipped her arm around his shoulder, and he seemed to draw the strength to continue from her touch, "Danzō knew that the Sandaime would never allow him to take me into his ROOT, so he sent a number of his best shinobi to take me. They took me back to the ROOT base and that's where I stayed from then onwards."

Iruka frowned, "What about Hinata here then?"

Naruto smiled, "I was getting to that. A month and seventeen days later, do you remember what happened the night of December the twenty-seventh?"

Iruka frowned, "No, not really."

Naruto nodded, "The heiress to the Hyūga clan, who had been born not twenty-four hours before, was abducted straight out of her crib. The Hyūga never found out who'd done it. From what he know and heard, they suspected that Kumo had done it. In reality, it was ROOT."

Iruka nodded in thought for a second before he said, "Do the Hyūga know that you have returned?"

Hinata shrugged, "Considering I know nobody in the clan, there's really not much point in returning. I prefer to stay with Naruto-kun. Plus there are extenuating circumstances that mean I cannot go outside a certain range of Naruto-kun or we both pass out."

Iruka frowned, "Why?"

Naruto put his arm around Hinata's shoulders, "It's tied to how we got these," he tweaked one of Hinata's ears, prompting a giggle and a playful slap from the indigo-haired girl, "Danzō ran an experiment to see if he could create a person with the power of a jinchūriki but who wasn't actually a jinchūriki. It involved the two of us marking each other and we ended up like this. Hinata now has almost a whole tail's worth of Kyūbi's chakra in her body which is regenerating every time she uses some up. I'm still nine times stronger than she is, but she's very strong in her own right as a result."

Iruka nodded, "Out of interest, how good are you three?"

Sai spoke up for the first time, "Good enough that any one of the current Academy class would be utterly annihilated going up against any one of us. If, when we begin taijutsu training, you need to partner the three of us against other people, partner us against each other in a three-way combat. It'll be a far better plan because all that either combatant will get out of it is bruises, and they'd be lucky to even get one strike off on us."

Iruka nodded and stood up, "You've given me a lot to think about. Thank you for telling me all of this. May I ask why you're being so open with me, though?"

Naruto smirked, "If we're really going to learn anything beyond what we teach ourselves or already know at the Academy, you need to have an idea of our abilities so that we can properly monopolize our time in the Academy."

Iruka nodded and Hinata dropped the genjutsu, the Academy teacher walking back off towards the main building as the trio resumed eating their lunch.

-TR-

When they returned home that evening, each immediately started doing their own thing. Sai started painting a picture over by the window, Hinata lay on her back on the couch with one of her Academy textbooks and Naruto began honing his wakizashi.

After a while, Naruto set down his wakizashi and made a soft noise of irritation. Looking up at Hinata he said, "Want to go out for a walk? I need to find a weapon shop and buy new wakizashi, mine aren't worth crap anymore."

Hinata set aside her textbook and sat up, "That would be nice, Naruto-kun. We'll see you later, Sai-kun."

Sai said nothing; he just kept painting.

-TR-

Naruto and Hinata headed down into the village, ignoring the people who stared at their ears and tails. Hinata started giggling when Naruto ended up proving to be a great hit with a group of small children, who came rushing over as soon as they saw the duo and were permitted to pet Naruto's ears and tail.

It wasn't just the ears and tails that drew people's attention. The obvious resemblance to two important people in the village also drew people's eyes. Hinata's resemblance of the wife of the Hyūga clan head as well as her Byakugan made women jealous and men startled that anyone could be so attractive for such a young girl.

Naruto's appearance, on the other hand, left jaws dropping. Aside from the ears, tail and whisker marks on each cheek, he looked as though somebody had cloned the Yondaime Hokage and then made him younger than he should be.

This was highlighted when a masked jōnin with his headband over one eye and gravity-defying silver hair stopped dead on seeing Naruto and stammered, "N-Namikaze-sensei!"

Naruto stopped, "What did you call me?"

The man suddenly shook his head, "Never mind. I mistook you for someone I used to know." He disappeared in a puff of smoke.

Naruto and Hinata looked at each other, puzzled. "What was that about?"

Hinata shrugged and they continued on their way.

-TR-

Tenten Takeshi was _bored_. Her adoptive father had requested that she mind the shop for the day while he and his wife went to supervise the delivery of a shipment of ore, so she had been sitting there for most of the day with only the occasional shinobi or kunoichi to alleviate the monotony when they came to buy supplies.

Thus when the door opened, she immediately shot upright and forced a courteous smile onto her face, "Welcome to Takeshi Wares, how may I… help… you… today…?" The smile slid off her face and she gaped at the pair standing in the doorway.

They couldn't have been a more than a year younger than her, but the way they stood told her that these two were fully capable of tearing her to shreds and ransacking her shop if they had a mind to.

The girl on the left was obviously a Hyūga, while the boy on the right had a natural appearance that belied the strength that lay in his hands, held slackly at his sides but ever ready to spring into a defence if a threat presented itself.

Naruto and Hinata waited patiently as the girl surveyed them, her eyes finally fixing on their ears and tails. Hinata gave a polite cough, snapping the girl out of her daze, "Ah! How can I help you today?"

Naruto smiled, "My wakizashi just resigned their commission, so I need a new pair."

The girl raised an eyebrow, "You use dual wakizashi? Impressive. There aren't many who can do that."

Naruto scratched behind one ear. The girl's eyes followed it slightly as it twitched. "I've used them for years, which is probably why mine gave out recently. So do you have anything?"

The girl nodded, "I'm Tenten; if you come over here we can start looking at wakizashi."

Naruto nodded and followed Tenten over to the rack of wakizashi she indicated. Hinata wandered over to a rack of throwing weapons and began inspecting a kunai for nicks.

Naruto handed the first weapons Tenten handed him straight back, "No good. My old ones felt like extensions of my arm; these don't."

Tenten looked approvingly at him, "I'm definitely sure that you're a swordsman now. Try this pair." She handed him a new pair of wakizashi.

They went through another five sets of wakizashi before Tenten frowned and said, "I wonder… I'll be back in a minute."

She ran into the back of the shop and returned a minute later with two wakizashi wrapped in a blanket. Unwrapping them she held them up, "My tou-san told me that his great-grandfather made these. In that time nobody has ever been able to wield them."

Naruto surveyed the weapons. One was in a blue sheath with white decoration. White kanji inscribed down the sapphire hilt spelled out the name Kōtāna. (Cortana)

The other weapon was in a green sheath with the same pattern of decorations laid out in black. Black kanji down the emerald hilt spelled out the name Deyuran. (Durandal)

**(A/N: Any self-respecting Bungie fan will recognize the references I just made, but does said Bungie fan know where **_**those**_** references cam from originally? Let me tell you; Cortana was originally named after the Curtana, the sword belonging to Ogier the Dane, while Durandal (or Durendal, Durandel or however the hell it's supposed to be spelt) was named for the sword belonging to Roland, the paladin of Charlemagne. So… yeah. A little piece of interesting trivia for you there. I will refer to them as Cortana and Durandel because I'm a lazy little git.)**

Tenten picked up the blades and reversed her grip on the sheaths before extending the hilts towards Naruto, "Give them a go. See how you do."

Naruto hesitated for a split second before gently wrapping his fingers around the hilts of the two wakizashi and pulled.

They slid from their sheaths with barely a whisper, each of them revealing a keen blade of pale silver metal that glinted in the light from the overhead fittings.

Hinata watched from the other side of the room as Naruto finished drawing the blades and smiled, "Perfect. Just what I was looking for."

Tenten smiled as she set the sheaths down and held out a hand, "I'm afraid these will have to be triple price because of how unique they are."

Naruto nodded as he unbuckled the straps of his old wakizashi sheaths and strapped on the new ones, "I understand. Give me a second… got it!"

He finished fastening the straps and dug into his belt pouch for his wallet. Having finally dug it out, he asked, "How much?"

Tenten gave him a slightly apologetic look, "Three thousand six hundred ryō."

Naruto quietly handed over the bills and picked up his old wakizashi sheaths. Tenten pointed to them, "I can take those and the old weapons off your hands if you like."

Naruto's left ear twitched, which Hinata easily recognized as the way Naruto showed being slightly surprised, "Really?"

Tenten nodded, "Yes… it's one of the services we offer, we take old weapons and supplies off the hands off our customers and use the materials we get out of them to make new things. For example these," she flicked one of the sheaths with her fingernail, drawing a soft _ping_ from the metal and a soft _thwack _from the leather, "the metal part that contains the blade can be used to line other new sheaths, and while the leather on the outside is obviously pitted and worn from use it is still strong. Depending on how it is treated we may be able to cut thongs out of it for rope, straps, and so on."

Naruto nodded, "Alright then. I'll bring the wakizashi by after the Academy lets out tomorrow. Will you be here?"

Tenten nodded, "My parents are out of town for the rest of the week."

Naruto nodded, "Right. Well thank you, Tenten-san."

Tenten smiled, "Make sure to come back if you need anything else! We also run a weekly offer on sword inspections so if you ever suspect that your blades are becoming weak from constant use in combat, bring them to us and we'll give them a look over!"

Naruto smiled, "Will do. Thanks again!" He and Hinata walked out of the shop.

-TR-

They arrived at the Academy early the next morning and started practicing their taijutsu in a corner of the yard. They eventually stepped it up a notch when swords were drawn and it devolved into a full-fledged melee not long after that.

Sasuke Uchiha walked through the gates of the Academy, as usual followed by his fangirls, when a sudden ruckus drew his attention. Across the yard he could see the trio from yesterday fighting. They seemed to be exceptionally dirty fighters, using feet, elbows, knees and shoulders along with their swords, and once they even butted heads.

A wave of fury rose in his chest that _they_ knew how to fight like that and _he_, the last Uchiha, did not. The final straw came a second later when Naruto did a back flip away from Hinata, sheathed his swords and began flashing through seals before spitting what seemed to be a ball of compressed air down at the other two, who dodged.

Sasuke watched as the ball hit the ground and cracked it for twenty feet in every direction, instantly turning the relatively flat yard into a rocky terrain.

Sasuke stormed over, the fangirls following him. Sai noticed, "We have company guys."

Naruto had drawn his swords again by this point, so when he parried Hinata's next strike and pushed her back he sheathed them again. Hinata returned her own swords to their sheaths as well as Sasuke reached them.

"As the last Uchiha, I demand that you give me those weapons and teach me all your jutsu for my own use!"

Naruto scratched his chin, "Hmm, how about… no."

Sasuke went brick red, "How dare you refuse me! I'm an elite Uchiha and you three are just commoners!"

Naruto took a step forwards and jabbed him hard on the forehead with his index and middle fingers, causing the Uchiha to fall on his butt, "If you'd been a little more polite and said please I might have been tempted to assist you with your chakra control and _maybe_ taught you a low-level jutsu, but since you were just impolite my answer is no. Now run along before you get injured."

Sasuke went brick red at Naruto's unknowing imitation of Itachi. As the blond turned his back on him, Sasuke flashed through seals, "Katon: Gōkakyū no Jutsu!"

Jaws dropped as Sasuke breathed out a long trail of flames over the blond male. The blast continued for a long minute before fading and leaving Naruto standing in rather charred clothing, quite still. Slowly he turned to face the Uchiha, and the fangirl mob quailed at the look of death in his eyes.

"Did you want something, _Uchiha_?"

Sasuke decided to be ballsy, "Now that you see how much better I am than you, I order you to give me your weapons and every one of your jutsu!"

Naruto gave a very scary smile as the fangirl mob scattered towards the Academy, leaving their "precious Uchiha" to his fate. Amazing what terror can do to a person. "There we go then Uchiha, time for you to learn a lesson you should have learned years ago; being an Uchiha is nothing. I had to _earn_ my skill with jutsu. Your family just copy them off people who worked hard to master them, with no consideration for the original user's feelings about it!"

"LIAR!" yelled Sasuke and ran forwards, his fists raised to attack Naruto. Naruto simply stepped sideways and stuck out his leg, tripping Sasuke on his face.

"SASUKE!" yelled a loud voice, and all of them turned to see Iruka standing in the doorway into the Academy looking utterly livid, "YOU DO NOT USE POSSIBLY FATAL JUTSU ON YOUR CLASSMATES!"

Sasuke pushed himself upright, "I'm an Uchiha! It should be an honour for him to teach me his jutsu!"

Naruto growled, "Oh really? An honour is it?"

Sasuke turned to him, "Yes. It is. Now teach me!"

A sadistic spark appeared in Naruto's eye, "Oh I'll teach you alright. I'll teach you to respect other people, little boy!" He leaned forwards and grabbed Sasuke by the back of his neck, "It's time to be taught your lesson, Uchiha."

"Put me down! Katon: Gōkaky-oof!" Naruto had punched him in the stomach to stop him using his jutsu again; it stung enough the first time.

Naruto smiled, "Come on, Uchiha. I'm sure you can make up the difference in extra work when you get out of what I have planned. Come along little one."

-TR-

Sasuke Uchiha would later be found by the ANBU naked, trussed up, gagged and hanging off the nose of the Nidaime Hokage like a black-haired bogey.

-TR-

"Naruto-kun?" said Hinata once Naruto has returned from doing whatever to the Uchiha.

"Yes?" he asked as he smiled at his girlfriend.

Hinata pointed behind him, "Your tail is still on fire from that first jutsu."

Naruto frowned and looked behind him, "Hmm, so it is." He reached back and pinched his tail between forefinger and thumb, extinguishing the smouldering fur. It healed itself a few seconds later as Naruto turned to face Iruka, "Hey Iruka-sensei."

Iruka frowned, "Was that strictly necessary, Naruto?"

Naruto frowned, "Rule of escalation. If they don't learn their lesson the first time, make the next one even worse."

Iruka frowned, "Wasn't that his first offence though?"

Naruto smirked, "I believe in hitting them with your worst straight off the bat, that way you discourage future attempts as brutally as possible."

Iruka nodded, "Right. Well I'm sure he can make up the difference later as you already said. Come on inside."

-TR-

The next few months passed without much incident. Sasuke went to the civilian council and tried to get them to order Naruto, Hinata and Sai to hand over everything they knew and possessed to him, and the order actually went through. Naruto flatly refused however, and Sasuke received a rather unpleasant beating as a result before being tossed into the women's hot spring with PERVERT spray-painted on his backside.

Sasuke never told anybody what happened to him in that hot spring, but for ages afterwards he couldn't so much as look at anything even remotely resembling a snake without shrieking in fear and jumping on the desk.

True to his word, Iruka only pitted Naruto, Hinata and Sai against each other in taijutsu spars. After seeing a genuine demonstration of their abilities (the previous spar on their second day at the Academy notwithstanding) he started using them as an example of how real shinobi fought; using any advantage they had.

Hinata also pointed out that women had an advantage that men did not have; since all men were at least closet perverts, a kunoichi who wasn't afraid to show off her natural charms to gain an advantage in a fight had an immediate advantage over said male since more often than not they would be too busy ogling to notice a kunai approaching his forehead at high speed.

For some reason, this statement didn't go down very well with one of the kunoichi instructors whose job was to teach kunoichi how to blend in as civilians, a woman by the name of Suzume. She tried to have Hinata thrown out of the Academy as a "slutty harlot who obviously had no pride in her gender".

Hinata verbally tore her down in five minutes with a long lecture on the proper definition of a "ninja" and how their job was to achieve victory on their missions by any means necessary. The way she described this was something along the lines of: "Honour is for the samurai, not for ninja. Naruto-kun, Sai-kun and I will do anything to complete our missions when we become genin; _anything_. If I have to pull my top open to distract an enemy shinobi so that Naruto-kun or Sai-kun can stab him in the back, I'll do it. If any of us has to slit our wrists so we can spray blood in our opponent's eyes to blind him and gain an opening to strike, we'll do it. Making young would-be kunoichi believe that they should be demure is the stupidest crap I've ever heard."

Suzume had had no counter-argument for that, so Hinata had simply walked away and left her standing there for a long time afterwards.

-TR-

They returned home later that evening after a pleasant meal at Ichiraku Ramen to find a window open that they were sure they'd closed before leaving. Naruto walked up to it and closed it before announcing to the silent apartment, "You really need to mask the evidence of your entry better. I know you're there so you might as well come out."

He turned to see a camouflage jutsu collapse, revealing a ROOT shinobi. Naruto tutted, "Danzō-jii hasn't given up on getting us back has he?"

The ROOT shinobi said nothing, simply drawing his tantō. A second later he twitched, grabbed at his arm and collapsed on the floor, having just suffered a fatal heart attack thanks to a Jyūken strike in the back.

Naruto smiled at Hinata, who stood behind the ROOT shinobi with a sheen of chakra still emanating from her index and middle fingers, "Thanks, Hinata-chan."

Hinata smiled happily at him, "No problem, Naruto-kun. What shall we do with the body?"

Naruto smirked, "Let's send Danzō-jii a little message."

-TR-

Danzō opened the box that had been left on his doorstep to find the severed head of one of his ROOT shinobi lying inside, sightless eyes staring up at him and a scroll jammed in his mouth. Danzō pried out the scroll and unrolled it with his single hand.

_Dear senile old bastard,_

_As you can see, your little plans to have one of our ex-comrades either silence us or return us to your control have failed miserably. I think the standard of your shinobi has dropped slightly since we left; we knew he was there the second we entered the apartment. What kind of infiltrating ninja leaves the window he entered through open when it had been closed before? Not a very good one is the answer to that._

_Anyway, I advise you to refrain from sending any more of our former comrades after us. After all you never know what little titbits of information about your operations could find their way into the Hokage's hands, and the best part of it all is you can't have us accused of treason for it._

_After all you taught us yourself that the Yondaime ordered ROOT be disbanded, and since we aren't technically supposed to exist any more you'd have to provide conclusive proof of ROOT's continuing existence as well as how we came to be in it to the council before you could so much as spit-shine our shoes. I somehow doubt the Hyūga clan would take that very well; the news that it was in fact one of the "esteemed Elders" of Konoha that was responsible for their first daughter's disappearance the day after she was born._

_Not only would it be considered treason by _you_ that you abducted the heiress to a noble clan of Konoha in order to make her one of your emotionless little tools and experimented on her as well, but also the fact that you disobeyed a direct order from the previous Hokage as well._

_As such I believe we have the upper hand over you for the moment. This is your last warning Danzō; leave my friends and I alone._

_Naruto._

Danzō crumpled up the scroll and threw it at the rubbish bin before summoning one of his lackeys to dispose of the severed head. He was sorely tempted to throw everything he had at the three runaways and see how they coped, but the truth was that Naruto was right; he had no grounds on which to prosecute them without revealing his own secrets in the process.

Sighing, he headed off to make some tea and think. There was a lot to be done, and only a few more years in which to do it.

**(A/N: And so ends the second chapter of Team ROOT. I'm glad the first chapter got such a great reception, and I was flattered that people think it will turn out as well as if not better than Sealed Kunai.**** I guess we'll just have to wait and see how things go from here. Now, as usual I will now post an update on my other works of fiction and how each chapter is progressing. Blade in the Shadows, which is apparently the longest without an update (almost two months, sheesh) currently stands at 2,396 words. I'm sorry it's taking so long but the Kiri Civil War Arc is giving me more trouble than I originally bargained for. Next, When Jutsu Go Wrong. As of now, the chapter currently stands at 1,481 words. Reign of Ice is next with 1,419 words. Now, The Bijuu Sage is also giving me a little bit of trouble, the chapter stands at a mere 632 words since I've hit a block but it is definitely moving very slowly. The Rinnegan Maelstrom is in a similar state of slow movement with 4,769 words. Let me reiterate; I am working as hard and fast as I can but I can only do so much at once. Hopefully with this chapter posted I can get a little more done to one of the others. Until then, this is Leonineus saying GOODNIGHT!)**


	3. Part 1: Family, Graduation & C Ranks

Team ROOT

Chapter Three, Part One: Family, Graduation & C-Ranks

**(A/N: I feel I should probably mention that unless otherwise stated, Naruto and Hinata usually have henge over their ears and tails so that they don't unnerve people when walking around. This is the reason that nobody seems to be commenting on them usually. Also, this is an announcement for anybody looking for a sequel to Both Sides of the Kunai. Yes, there will be a sequel. No, it will not air just yet. Yes, I am writing it. Now kindly stop sending me private messages asking; as much as the average of five people a day asking is awesome and quite flattering, it is getting somewhat irritating. Now enjoy the chapter!)**

Naruto, Hinata and Sai had now been at the Academy for half a year, and were currently working through their homework for the weekend when there was a knock at the door.

Naruto went to answer it, and was surprised to find three people he recognized from Danzō's files on Konoha's clans: Hiashi Hyūga, the clan head; his wife Hitomi holding a girl of about two years old (and already had the instantly recognizable Byakugan eyes blinking curiously at Naruto's twitching fox-ears) and his twin brother and head of the Branch family, Hizashi Hyūga, who also had his hand resting on the head of a boy about a year older than Naruto and Hinata.

"Hello," said Hiashi politely (though Naruto did not miss the slight moment of startled shock he saw the man give his ears and tail), "May we come in?"

Naruto opened his mouth but at that moment Hinata appeared behind him, "Who is it, Naruto-kun?"

Hitomi Hyūga gasped, "She looks exactly like me!"

Naruto stepped backwards to compare for himself. A few seconds later he nodded, "You do look very similar…"

Hiashi frowned, "Our first-born daughter was snatched from her crib only a day after she was born. We named her Hinata."

Naruto grinned, slipping an arm around the shoulders of his bonded partner, "Well what do you know? Looks like we found your family Hinata-chan! Now if only we could find mine…"

Hizashi leaned backwards and scrutinized the boy, "He _does _resemble…"

Naruto's eyebrow rose, "Who?"

Hiashi shook his head, "I'll need to check with the Hokage to see if it's true, Hizashi. May we come in?"

Naruto stepped back with Hinata to allow them entrance.

Once everybody was seated in the lounge area, Hiashi cut to the chase, "Hinata, given that my other daughter Hanabi is currently too young to take up the post of heiress, I would like to extend an invitation to you, as the rightful heiress despite your initial disappearance, to move into the Hyūga compound and take up the mantle as heiress."

Hinata's eyes widened before a tear slid down her cheek. Naruto reached over and squeezed her hand as he felt sadness come through their mental link.

Hitomi picked up on the tear, "Is something wrong?"

Hinata shook her head, "I… I can't. Don't get me wrong, I want to but I can't. Not without Naruto."

At Hiashi's understandably puzzled expression, she continued, "The person who took us both… he did some kind of experiment on us. We ended up able to converse without words… but as a side effect we can't be too far apart at any given time. At present, the maximum range we can get away from each other is fifty feet."

Hitomi frowned, "Why don't you tell us the full story?"

Hinata swallowed and began to speak, Naruto and Sai occasionally butting in to add details she had missed.

When she was finished, Hiashi looked livid, "So this ROOT group, you say that the Yondaime specifically told Danzō Shimura to shut it down and he ignored him?"

Naruto nodded, "Yeah. Danzō seemed to take a great amount of interest and pleasure in telling me how he flouted "the great Yondaime Hokage". I'm not quite sure why."

Hizashi cast his brother a significant look, his thoughts obvious on his face; _"__It__'__s __because __he__'__s __the __Yondaime__'__s __heir!__"_

"Anyway," said Hitomi as she looked fondly upon Hinata, "Even though you must turn down the post as clan heiress, you will always have the support of the Hyūga, my daughter."

Hinata nodded, "Okay."

Neji sat up straighter in his chair, "I refuse to acknowledge her!"

Hizashi smacked him on the back of the head, "Neji, be polite!"

Hinata gave him a small smile, "Okay then. If you'll come with me, Neji-san, we can see about giving you a demonstration of my skills."

Neji stood up and followed her towards the door to the gym area. Naruto grinned, "You all may want to watch this. Hinata's going to destroy him."

Hiashi glanced at his brother for a brief second before all the Hyūga adults stood and followed Naruto and Sai towards the door through which Hinata had led Neji.

-TR-

The battle was short and brutal. Neji tried his best but was utterly thrashed in about a minute.

Finally he rolled over and groaned with pain, "How… how did you? You're a Hyūga! Underhanded strikes and jutsu should not be in your repertoire!"

Hinata bent over him, casually jabbing a few pressure points to immobilize his limbs, "That would be true if I had been raised a Hyūga. From what I was taught by my sensei, the Hyūga Elders believe that it is a disgrace to the Hyūga for them to use more than just their Jyūken in combat. This is a mistake. It gives the enemy a perfect overview of the Hyūga in question's abilities and therefore they will know how to counter it. That is how I defeated you, because I used what I know about the Jyūken to anticipate your motions and defeat you."

Hiashi exchanged a glance with his wife and brother. Naruto could tell at one glance that the man was startled by Hinata's knowledge of _real _battle tactics. He grinned, "Beautiful how good she is at this; isn't it?"

The three adult Hyūga could only nod, dumbstruck as they watched Hinata pick apart Neji's tactics and expose the flaws in each of his moves.

-TR-

"This is an outrage!" yelled one of the Hyūga Elders as he stood up and pointed at Hiashi, "I order you to go over there and seal that girl's Byakugan before she becomes a threat to the clan!"

Hiashi allowed himself a small smile, "I'm afraid that is out of the question. You see, our long-lost daughter is now at the stage where she _would_ make a good heiress to the clan, yes. Regrettably she cannot, however; and I will not tell you her secrets out of respect for her and her boyfriend and partner. What I can say however, that you are welcome to try sealing her yourself; but expect to come back to the compound either severely wounded or dead. Her, her boyfriend and their other friend are not the kind to suffer fools."

The Elder bristled at being called a fool before he said, "Very well, we will do it ourselves. It should not be difficult, we are Hyūga and they are children."

Hiashi smirked as the Elders stood up and headed for the door, "You have no idea…"

-TR-

Naruto opened the front door to find several Hyūga who seemed older than Hiashi on the doorstep. "Hello, can I help…" Naruto began to say before a chakra spike to the chest sent him crashing to the floor.

Hinata appeared out of the kitchen, "Naruto-kun?"

One of the Hyūga pointed at her, "You! Don't move!"

Hinata's eyes flashed before the veins around her eyes expanded and she settled into a Jyūken stance.

At that moment, all four Hyūga Elders collapsed, revealing Naruto and three of his Kage Bunshin standing there, their hands outstretched to where they had just pinched the pressure points on the backs of their necks.

Naruto wordlessly made another Kage Bunshin, after which the Bunshin gathered the Elders and carried them from the apartment.

They would all be found later that night, hanging from the Shodaime and Nidaime's noses; completely naked, bound and gagged.

**(A/N: This is actually what happened to Sasuke in the previous chapter; it was actually a Kage Bunshin that put him up there but I just forgot to state that it was a Kage Bunshin. Naruto never actually left Hinata's side apart from walking out of sight to make the Bunshin and give it its orders.)**

-TR-

When they walked through the Academy gates the next day, they found that Iruka was already leaning against the wall by the doors. This was a surprise since all three of them tended to turn up very early to get in a little extra training before starting the day's work.

As soon as the scar-nosed chūnin saw them he walked over, "Nice to see you three. I'd like to ask you about something."

Naruto nodded, "Do tell."

Iruka folded his arms, "You do remember last week, when I explained to the class about some of the atrocities committed by ninja?"

Hinata nodded, "We do. We've had to do more than a few of them back in ROOT, if I recall."

Iruka nodded, "Well I was planning something special for today. This is what I was going to do…"

A sly grin crossed Naruto's face, a second later crossing Hinata's as well, "Oh, I'm sure _we_can think of something…"

-TR-

Excited chatter filled the air as the class were led up behind the Hokage Monument on a field trip to see the Memorial Stone.

Iruka walked at the head of the throng with Naruto, Hinata and Sai almost directly behind him, and as he turned to face the class he briefly locked eyes with Hinata and gave a barely perceptible nod.

Hinata returned the nod and began to silently form handseals.

"Iruka-sensei," said Naruto, drawing their teacher's attention, "I need to take a leak."

Iruka nodded, "Okay Naruto, just hurry back."

Naruto nodded back and headed off into the trees.

The rest of the trip towards the Memorial Stone was not eventful, though Naruto did not return and a couple of the students started picking up on Iruka's concerned expression as he looked around for the absent blond. That was when it happened.

Around thirty Kumo-nin dropped into the clearing, their expressions predatory as they surrounded the class. "Well, well, well," sneered one, evidently the leader, "What a pleasant coincidence. A whole lot of Konoha's Academy students. This lot will fetch a pretty price back in Kumo!"

Iruka stepped in front of his students, "I will not let you harm so much as a hair on my students. Help should already be on the way."

The Kumo-nin laughed, "Help? Ha! Nobody knows we're here; we killed the boy who went off to the bathroom since he tried to fight back!"

Hinata gasped, "N-Naruto-kun?"

One of the Kumo-nin dispensed something he was carrying over his shoulder onto the floor, and Hinata gave a cry of horror and fell to her knees as she saw Naruto lying limp on the ground, his chest riddled with bloody stab wounds and a look of horror still frozen on his face. Numerous cries came from other students as Hinata crawled to Naruto and began crying on his chest. One of the Kumo-nin dragged her up by the hair, "Hey, this one's a Hyūga! And a pretty one at that! Think we could have a bit of fun with her before we hand her over to become a breeder, taichō?"

The man shrugged, "Might as well; it's all she'll be good for from now on. Same with the other girls."

One of the other Kumo-nin reached out and stroked Ino's hair before taking a quick feel of her ass. She tried to slap him but missed, "Pervert!"

Iruka chose that moment to mount an attack, but all it brought was death as the Kumo-nin plunged a hand covered in lightning chakra through the chūnin's heart. Blood sprayed the students who were standing behind him, causing the girls amongst their number to scream. Sai was next, hitting the ground with a katana buried in his chest and his tantō dropping from limp fingers.

Sasuke attacked the Kumo-nin, but was brought down by a punch in the gut before the captain of the Kumo squad bent over and dragged him up by the collar, "An Uchiha! He'll be useful, though we might just transplant his precious Sharingan if he's going to be stubborn! I'm sure some _real _Kumo-nin could use them better!"

Sasuke swore and spat into the Kumo-nin's face, only to be slammed into the ground a second later and knocked out with a hard stomp to the head.

Akamaru and Kiba attacked, but Akamaru was kicked into a tree and Kiba was dropped just as Sasuke had been. After that the Kumo-nin tied their wrists and set them marching north, all the time whispering to the girls about how much "fun" they were going to have breaking them before they got to Kumo. Sasuke and Kiba were carried, and Hinata was dragged by two other Kumo-nin since she was too stricken with grief over Naruto's death to resist.

Before they'd got too far however, their surroundings suddenly faded into mist and the Kumo-nin disappeared.

Shikamaru and Shino, the two smartest in the group, were the first to work it out. Shikamaru thought for a second before he said, "Whoever's doing this genjutsu, come on out!"

There was a moment's pause and then the mist disappeared, revealing their surroundings exactly as they had been, with Naruto, Hinata and Sai all standing in front of them with Iruka.

The chūnin nodded, "Very astute, Shikamaru."

"I knew it was a genjutsu the whole time; I just played along!" boasted Sasuke to cries of, "Sasuke-kun is so cool".

Naruto snorted, "Sure you did. I imagine if you'd had your Sharingan it wouldn't have fooled you, but as the only one who could've detected the genjutsu at once was actually the one DOING the genjutsu…" he gestured towards Hinata, who smiled and waved.

"Now," said Iruka, "I hope you all learned a valuable lesson from this. Just because you are children does not mean that enemy ninja won't kill you or do terrible things to you. Once you put on your hitai-ate, you are legally adults and have to put up with all the associated responsibilities." He pointed at the Memorial Stone in the clearing nearby, "On that stone are engraved the names of every shinobi who has ever given their life for Konoha. The Shodaime and Nidaime Hokages are both there, as is the Yondaime for his sacrifice to destroy the Kyūbi no Kitsune."

Naruto met Hinata's gaze as Iruka continued, "Will you do that? Are you willing to lay down your lives for Konoha? Because _that_ is what it means to be a _proper _ninja."

-TR-

**Three and a half years later.**

"Alright, Naruto," said Iruka, "For this last test you need to make a set of Bunshin."

Naruto grinned, "Does it matter what type they are?"

When Iruka shook his head Naruto's hands flew to a cross seal, "Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!"

Eight solid clones appeared around him, four on each side.

Iruka grinned as he made a quick mark on his clipboard and threw Naruto's headband to him (the three of them having given Iruka their headbands to give back once they passed the exam), "You pass. Congratulations Naruto!"

Naruto grinned, tying his headband back in place around his forehead and smirking as he walked out to rejoin his friends.

-TR-

The next day, the trio walked in and took their usual seats at the back of the class, where they sat and talked until Iruka walked in with a clipboard and said, "Alright all of you. Your teams are as follows, and I'm only going to say this one so make sure you listen."

The students started paying attention and Iruka looked down at his clipboard, "First of all, Team 11. This team will comprise Naruto Uzumaki, Hinata Hyūga and Sai, and your sensei will be ANBU Neko."

"Hey!" shouted Sasuke, "How come _they _get an ANBU at that?"

Iruka growled, Sasuke's constantly haughty attitude starting to wear on his last nerve, "Special circumstances and the Hokage's order, Sasuke."

Sasuke scowled, "I guess I'll just have to take this up with the council!"

Naruto snorted, "The Hokage is the ultimate authority in this village. The most that mass of arse-kissers called the civilian council can do is whinge."

"_Anyway_," said Iruka loudly, cutting off Sasuke's retort, "Team 10 will be Ino Yamanaka, Shikamaru Nara and Chōji Akimichi under Asuma Sarutobi. Team 8 will be Kiba Inuzuka, Shino Aburame, and Sakura Haruno with Kurenai Yūhi as your sensei."

Sasuke stood up, "What about me? Where's _my _sensei?"

Iruka frowned, "I don't know. It seems you may need to return to the Academy for another year and graduate next time."

Sasuke went red with fury, "I'M AN UCHIHA! I SHOULD HAVE A SENSEI, NOW!"

"Wow," commented Naruto, "Is he seriously having a tantrum because he didn't get what he wanted?"

"Actually," said a voice from the doorway as five people walked in, "I'm supposed to take him on as an apprentice."

Sasuke instantly looked smug, "Good, no team to drag me down or get in my way."

Naruto and Hinata shared a grin before simultaneously deadpanning, "I find your lack of faith in your comrades disturbing."

"Anyway," said the only one in the group wearing a mask, "Which of you are Naruto Uzumaki, Hinata Hyūga and Sai?"

Naruto raised his hand, "That'd be us, sensei."

The woman nodded and raised her hand to remove her mask, "I'm Yūgao Uzuki, or Neko. I'm going to be your sensei."

Naruto, Hinata and Sai stood up and filed out of the classroom after her as the woman standing next to Yūgao said, "I'm Kurenai Yūhi, where are Kiba Inuzuka, Shino Aburame and Sakura Haruno?"

-TR-

Yūgao met the three genin on Training Ground 11, where the first thing she said was, "I know where you come from, I know your skills and I know that all three of you have been training and running missions since you were about four. I even know about your little secrets…"

Naruto sighed and signalled to Hinata, who dropped the genjutsu around the duo's fox ears and tails.

Yūgao nodded, "I even know that you three shouldn't be genin, chūnin or even jōnin. That's why…" she drew her katana as two other ANBU appeared and drew their own, "I brought these guys to help me test your skills."

Naruto drew his wakizashi, the blades glinting sapphire and emerald in the sunlight as he reversed his grip on Cortana in his left hand and raised Durandel into a blocking stance.

"Those are interesting blades," said the dragon-masked ninja as he took a step towards Naruto while Yūgao approached Hinata and the gecko-masked nin headed in Sai's direction, "Let's see how well you use them."

Metal clashed as Naruto's wakizashi slammed into the dragon-masked nin's katana before they separated again.

"Just out of interest," said Hinata in a conversational tone as she pushed Yūgao's katana back one-handed with one of her tantō, "Do you want us to go all-out and try to kill you? Or should we hold back just enough to avoid that conclusion?"

Yūgao's mask tilted slightly, expressing her curiosity, "I am trying to get an accurate idea of your skills. Going at full-power would be much appreciated."

Hinata smiled happily, "Alright. Hey Naruto-kun, Sai-kun! We've got permission to completely cut loose!"

Naruto, who was currently engaged with the dragon-masked ANBU, looked over and grinned even as the dragon-masked ANBU executed a swipe at his head and he dodged underneath, "Excellent. Let's show these three exactly what we can do!"

Sai whipped a scroll from his belt as a faint red glow began to appear around Hinata and Naruto.

The gecko-masked ANBU suddenly had to dodge a set of ink lions as Sai called, "Chōjū Giga!" while Neko was forced to Kawarimi as a spike of red chakra sailed at her from Hinata's palm thrust.

The dragon-masked ANBU, on the other hand, was now finding himself somewhat beleaguered by Naruto, who was wreathed in red chakra and causing all kinds of hell for him. He had already been forced to unleash his Mokuton in an attempt to restrain him but without some kind of focus on the boy's person, it was having about as much effect as trying to restrain him with wet paper towels. The ground around them was littered with pieces of shattered wood.

Naruto had also begun demonstrating that even in his yōki-fuelled state, he was still fully capable of sneak attacks. As such Ryū suddenly found himself dodging Kage Bunshin emerging from below the ground to attack him, though it was easy to avoid their strikes and deliver his own to get rid of them.

Gecko was trying to keep clear of two ink behemoths with clubs as well as Sai with his tantō, and was having a fairly tough time of it as the pale boy and his golems were excellently co-ordinated.

Neko had just avoided another chakra-powered thrust from Hinata when she froze, the cold steel of a blade against the nape of her neck telling her that the grinning girl in front of her had effortlessly played her into a checkmate.

Sheathing her katana, Neko said, "I yield."

Hinata beamed before springing away to assist her team.

Ryū had just dispelled Naruto's last clone when he sensed something approaching at high speed. He immediately shunshined clear, only just avoiding Hinata as she hit the ground where he had stood before leaping away to join Naruto.

Even as he turned to face them again, both leapt forwards, "Konbijutsu: Kitsune Hayakuchi Omasshō!" (Collaboration Technique: Obliterating Fox Twisters)

Ryū used Kawarimi just in time as the log he swapped with was mercilessly rent asunder by the two spinning genin hitting it before they diverged and circled around for another attack.

The game of impromptu cat-and-mouse continued for another minute until they abandoned the technique and drew their swords again.

Naruto slashed Durandel through the air, parrying one of Ryū's strikes before Hinata darted under his guard and delivered a gentle poke to one of the ANBU's nerve points.

His arm muscles instantly locked up, the katana slipping from numb fingers as Naruto brought Cortana up to rest the razor edge against his collarbone.

As soon as Ryū had given the signal that he yielded, they were off to aid Sai.

Gecko had been able to hold his own against Sai this long, but when Naruto and Hinata brought the number of blades he had to avoid to five he was forced to yield.

Now they stood in front of Neko waiting for her verdict.

"I've seen what the three of you can do," she said, "and I must say I'm most impressed. You pass."

Naruto and Hinata high-fived and Sai smiled, "I need to go and deliver my report to the Hokage. We go for our first mission tomorrow. Dismissed."

-TR-

Naruto's team were the first to arrive at the mission room the next morning, all three of them geared up and ready for the day to begin.

It turned out that their new sensei had declared them already fit for at least C-rank missions, because Sarutobi gave each of them a mission dorm and asked them to pick one to take, any one of which would require at least a day's travel. After all three had spent a few minutes having a huddled discussion at the side of the room, Hinata was elected as spokesperson.

"It appears that the escort and assault missions both take place along the same route, so I propose we take both and bring down the bandit encampment en route to Ta no Kuni."

Sarutobi frowned, "That would mean endangering the client, which is out of the question."

Hinata shook her head, "If we, Naruto-kun and I that is, leave a Kage Bunshin each with Sai and Neko-sensei to protect the client, we can destroy the bandits and return quite quickly. The client will still be safe and the bandit threat will have been dealt with; two birds with one stone."

The Hokage thought it over for a minute. It was definitely a sound plan. "Very well," he said finally, "But your first priority is the safety of the client. If necessary, deliver the client first and then deal with the bandits."

The three ex-ROOT shinobi nodded, "Understood, sir."

Sarutobi sent for the client, who turned out to be an attractive woman in her thirties with bright grey eyes and chestnut hair who introduced herself as Chizuru Yurihime.

One Yūgao had given them instructions on where to meet her, the trio set off to gather the necessary supplies for their mission.

-TR-

When they met Yūgao at Konoha's gates, all three were already fully equipped. Each of them had their weapons strapped securely onto their bodies and each had donned their old ROOT masks. In short, they looked like an ANBU team off on a mission.

Naruto saluted Yūgao as they landed beside her, "Operatives Yōkō, Tenshi and Sai reporting for duty, Neko-taichō!"

The ANBU woman chuckled, "You three ready then? Now we're just waiting on the client."

At that moment, said client came around the corner, "My apologies, I was temporarily held up."

"Held up" was one word for it, Naruto thought, looking up at the stacks of shopping bags stuffed with clothes that an older genin team (including a person he recognized as Neji Hyūga) were carrying behind her.

He exchanged a look with Hinata behind his mask. This mission might prove a little more difficult than they had assumed.

"Ah, ANBU-san!" boomed what was evidently the jōnin of the team from under the biggest pile of bags, "I take it you are this youthful lady's escort?"

Yūgao nodded curtly as her three students moved forwards and began storing the client's purchases in sealing scrolls, "Thank you Gai, you can go."

Gai nodded, beckoned to his students and left. Yūgao turned to look at the client, "Ma'am, are you ready to go?"

The woman nodded and they headed out of the gates.

-TR-

It quickly became apparent to all four Konoha ninja that their charge had glaring attitude issues. She started complaining of fatigue and sore feet after barely half an hour, insisted they get her some food (then turned up her nose at what they gave her) and constantly threatened to not pay them after the mission if they didn't "shape up and provide more adequate service for someone of her station".

Finally she sat down stubbornly on a mile marker and said, "I am not moving another step until all of you have some other method of getting me home! I'm tired, my feet hurt and I'm getting dirt all over my clothes!"

Naruto looked her up and down. "Lady Yurihime-sama," he said, using the title she had insisted on after Hinata had mistakenly called her "Miss Yurihime", thus prompting a tantrum from the 'Client from Hell', "I do not wish to appear rude, but perhaps if you were wearing more suitable clothing…"

She immediately looked offended, conveniently ignoring that he was right; the crimson silk kimono and high-heeled platform shoes she was wearing were hardly appropriate walking attire, "How dare you insult me like this? My husband will have your head!"

Naruto shook his head in exasperation, "And your husband is…?"

The woman drew herself up, "The daimyō of Ta no Kuni!"

Naruto looked over at Hinata, _"__Blatant __lie__…"_

His bonded partner nodded, _"__Yes. __Not __only __did __her __chakra __briefly __darken __but __she __can__'__t __hide __the __normal __indicators __of __deceit __like __most __politically-connected __figures __and __ninja __can. __I __doubt __she__'__s __even __anything __to __do __with __the __daimyō __of __Ta __no __Kuni.__"_

Naruto smirked. Part of their training back in ROOT had been about reading body language to detect lies, and Hinata had ultimately been far better at it than him since her Byakugan allowed her to see the tiny indicators that even a true master of controlling his body language was incapable of hiding. It had served them well during those years.

Turning his head back towards their client he said, "Nice try, but you're like an open book when you lie. Care to try again?"

There was a pause while the client gaped at them, then she swallowed, "O-Okay, I'm only the daimyō's mistress… but I know he'll divorce his wife soon! I know it!"

Her expression suddenly turned shrewd, "Maybe if I paid you a bit more you could help me? You kill the daimyō's wife and I give you some extra cash, off the books of course."

The four shinobi looked at each other before Yūgao spoke, "I'm afraid that barring unexpected circumstances altering the mission is out of the question."

The woman looked pleading, "But this _is_ unexpected…"

"No. Our job is to take _you_ back to Ta no Kuni and ensure you get there in one piece. Nothing more."

"Come to think of it," Naruto said, "We are getting close to the border. Should Tenshi and I head off for our secondary objective now?"

Yūgao nodded, "You do that, but leave some Kage Bunshin behind."

The two ROOT shinobi nodded, created an exact duplicate each and took off, heading west as fast as they could.

"Where are they going?" Yurihime jumped up from the mile marker and looked after them.

Sai looked around, "To deal with our secondary objective; wiping out a bandit camp near the border. Their clones will be fine to help protect you until they return."

"Let's keep going," Yūgao interjected before Yurihime could reply, "It's getting late in the day."

The group continued on their way.

-TR-

**A short time later.**

Naruto and Hinata lay on their stomachs, looking down at the bandit camp below the rocky overhand on which they perched.

Hinata activated her Byakugan, _"__I __see __between __two __and __three __hundred __bandits; __definitely __more __than __we __anticipated.__"_

"_Not __an __issue,__" _Naruto replied, _"__We__'__ve __faced __worse __odds. __Remember __that __time __we __got __caught __by __a __load __of __Kumo __BOLT __on __our __way __back __from __carrying __out __an __assassination __some __distance __outside __the __capital __of __Kaminari __no __Kuni? __That __was __some __nasty __trouble; __we __were __lucky __they __didn__'__t __see __anything __that __linked __us __to __Konoha __and __decided __to __stop __at __the __border __or __we__'__d __have __been __doomed.__"_

Hinata nodded and began flicking through seals. A second passed and then all hell broke loose in the camp below them.

-TR-

"I am constantly surprised by the potency of your genjutsu," Naruto commented as the duo walked through the camp five minutes later. The ground was saturated with blood which bubbled up around their boots as they moved and bodies were piled against the tents, some of them having died in the act of cutting others down. Naruto carefully avoided trailing his tail through a huge pool of gore, conscious that cleaning blood out of their tails was something both of them absolutely hated.

Hinata nodded, "Such a waste of human life though, even if they are bandits…"

Naruto didn't respond; he knew what Hinata was feeling. The genjutsu she had used was based on the Yamanaka clan's Shinranshin no Jutsu (Mind Body Disturbance Technique); it made the targets think that those around them were enemies. When used on a scale such as Hinata had just done the result was, more often than not, absolute carnage.

As they finished their search for any survivors and turned to leave they heard a voice, "Honestly, the best they could spare to hunt us down is two kids? Pathetic!"

Naruto and Hinata whipped around and immediately drew their weapons. A group of people stood nearby, each of them wearing a scratched headband.

"Two Kusa, one Konoha, three Kumo and one Iwa…" Hinata muttered.

Naruto nodded slightly before speaking, "I assume you are the leaders of these bandits then?"

"We were," grumbled one of the Kumo missing-nin, who appeared to be the youngest, "until you two came along."

Naruto snorted, "Oh, how my heart bleeds for your misfortune."

The Iwa-nin growled, "Let's just kill them and be done with it!"

Naruto and Hinata reached up to lower their masks back over their faces, having pushed them back up during their search to give their faces some air, but at that moment one of the Kumo shinobi spoke, "Hold on. What is your name?"

Naruto frowned, noting the man's dark skin, black hair and gold eyes, "Naruto. Naruto Uzumaki."

The last Kumo shinobi snorted derisively, prompting the duo to look over at him, "I see. The Uzumaki bitch must have married _him_."

Naruto's frown deepened, "Who is "him"?"

The Iwa ninja laughed harshly, "Are you stupid, boy? Your resemblance of the accursed Yondaime Hokage can be no coincidence! You must be his spawn, and when I bring you back to Iwa I will be reinstated and inaugurated as the Yondaime Tsuchikage before the day is out!"

Naruto showed no visible reaction, but his mind was racing, _"__The __Yondaime? __Well __that __would __certainly __explain __Danzō __always __gloating __about __flouting __him__… __and __Hizashi __Hyūga__'__s __reaction __to __me __the __first __time __we __met.__"_

A surge of comforting emotion came over the mental link from Hinata, _"__Naruto-kun__…"_

Naruto steeled himself, _"__It __doesn__'__t __matter.__" _Out loud he said, "So? Doesn't matter to me; all of you are going to die here today. We'll both make sure of _that_."

**(A/N: Before people cuss me out for cutting it off like this; I'd like to explain that it was necessary. I originally intended this to be a single very long chapter, but when it got past 9.5k and where I intended to cut it off was _still_ nowhere in sight I decided to cut it down and make it a multi-parter. The next part is just over 4k as I write this A/N, and I still have about four or five pages to copy from my notebook… so chances are Part II might be out very quickly. Until then, folks! Leonineus, OUT!)  
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	4. Part 2: From Battle to Battle

Team ROOT

Chapter Three, Part Two: From Battle to Battle

**(A/N: And here is the latter part of the chapter, as promised. Enjoy! Also, for those of you who read and enjoyed Blade in the Shadows before it went on hiatus, rejoice! I had a think and I've decided I will rewrite it from the ground up, which means you might be seeing something new from Naruto Uzumaki, Grand Master of the Assassin Order soon.)**

The youngest missing-ninja attacked; arcs of lightning flying from his hands as two of the others moved as well; one Kusa-nin suddenly faded from view and the Iwa-nin's skin suddenly turned grey. As the two ROOT shinobi jumped apart, pulling their masks down over their faces, Naruto registered that the Iwa-nin was now behind him. Flipping aside as the Iwa-nin's fist cracked the ground where he had stood, Naruto quickly analyzed his opponent, _"Okay seemingly that grey tint to his skin has more to it than meets the eye. Seemingly it is some kind of ability which gives him greatly increased strength and I would guess resilience as well…"_

_"Naruto-kun, behind you!"_

Hinata's mental cry drew Naruto's attention just in time for him to duck as a lightning-sheathed, razor-edged chain whip cracked in the spot where his head had previously occupied. Had it hit home, his head would have been cut in half.

_"Let's try to avoid that," _Naruto remarked.

_"Indeed," _Hinata replied, before both their heads snapped around as they heard a cry from the single Konoha-nin,

"Jouro Senbon!" (Senbon Shower)

The missing-nin threw his umbrella into the air, which promptly filled with a hail of needles.

Hinata leapt in front of Naruto and twisted rapidly on the spot, "Hakkeshō Kaiten!"

A dome of spinning chakra rose around them, the senbon pinging off it as the Konoha missing-nin watched in mounting frustration. Finally the onslaught stopped and Hinata slowed to a halt.

Naruto's left ear twitched as he heard a cry of "Dokusei Kiri!" (Poison Mist) and he whipped around to see a huge purple cloud bearing down on them, a cloud which he could tell at a glance would not be good to make contact with.

Raising one hand he shouted, "Fūton: Daitoppa!" causing the cloud to be blown back and forcing the second Kusa-nin who had created it to Kawarimi away so as to avoid his own attack.

A soft jingling sound drew their attention and they both leapt away, somersaulting backwards over one of the tents to dodge the chain whip as it snapped through the air. Naruto and Hinata landed, Hinata just in front of Naruto as the blond sensed a faint chakra signature behind them, _"Hinata, behind us!"_

The duo reacted instantly, Hinata dropping to one knee in mid-turn so that Naruto's wakizashi passed over her head; their four blades cut through the air and caught on something, their successful impact rewarded with several gouts of blood and a cry of pain.

The first Kusa-nin reappeared, staggering backwards with several lurid red cuts across his chest and legs. His face contorted in fury, "Impossible! No mere children can see through my camouflage technique!"

Naruto smirked, "We're no mere children, moron. We're Konoha shinobi, and we don't lose."

A pair of sickle-like blades appeared, one in each of the Kusa-nin's hands as he snarled and raised them, "Well you're going to lose today, or I'm not the Kusa no Kakushi Kamakiri!" (Hidden Praying Mantis of the Grass)

Naruto brought up his weapon and deflected both blades to one side before bringing the other round in a vicious stab at the ninja's side, "The Kusa no Kakushi Kamakiri, huh? Well, after I kill you I should get a nice bounty from Kusa!" The Kusa-nin dodged and then the duo was off, their blades colliding so fast the air rang with the sound of metal.

Hinata watched this for a split second before realizing that she wasn't alone; she whipped around just in time to see a huge purple cloud bearing down upon her. Her hands flew together, flicked through seals and she took a deep breath, "Suiton: Teppōdama!"

The ball of water that flew from her lips hit the cloud, absorbed its contents and kept going, taking the Kusa-nin who had created it by surprise and hitting him in the face.

As he staggered backwards, his own poison taking effect on him and sending rivulets of blood pouring from his lips with each cough, Hinata sprang forwards like a tiger, "Hakke Rokujūyon Shō!"

Her fingers powered into the Kusa-nin's shoulder, sending him staggering backwards before she struck again, "Two palms! Four palms! Eight palms! Sixteen palms! Thirty-two palms! Sixty-four palms!"

Her final blow hit the Kusa-ninja squarely in the dead-centre of his chest and sent him flying backwards. He crashed to the ground and did not get up again.

_"Naruto-kun," _Hinata broadcast to her bondmate, _"My adversary is down."_

_"Okay, give me a minute."_

With her Byakugan, Hinata saw one of Naruto's Kage Bunshin be skewered by the Kusa-nin and disappear. The nin just had time to mutter, "Kage Bunshin!" before Naruto reappeared behind him and ended his life in a spray of blood.

"You know," Naruto commented, wrenching Cortana free and allowing the corpse to slump to the ground, "You guys don't seem quite as good as you apparently think you are."

The Iwa-nin snarled and charged as the first Kumo-nin flashed through seals and dropped to one knee, planting both hands on the ground, "Ranton: Kumo Kumo no Saito!" (Storm Release: Web of the Cloud Spider)

Arcs of lightning immediately began spreading, blossoming out from the nin's position and remaining a few inches from the ground at all times as he straightened back up. Naruto surveyed the ground as he dodged the charging Iwa-nin, _"The pattern appears random, which means…"_

Hinata took over, _"…that the technique is uncontrolled by him. The main danger seems to be that if one of the bolts connects with something that links it to the ground, say a person's leg, the current earthing itself in the ground through the leg will electrocute the victim. That means…"_

_"…that earthing the technique with something will weaken it drastically since it already has a route to the ground!" _Naruto finished, quickly planning his next move and kicking off the ground. Less than a second later a bolt of lightning shot through the space previously occupied by his right foot. Had it connected, he'd have become a human sparkler.

The Iwa-nin looked up as his blond adversary flipped over his head and threw both his wakizashi, before he was forced to cover his face as sparks showered in every direction, the bolts of lightning now effectively earthed as Naruto's wakizashi served as impromptu lightning rods.

Naruto twisted his body in midair and began making handseals, "Kitsune Hanyō Hijutsu: Kitsunebi no Ōda!" (Bludgeoning Fox Tail)

His tail became instantly stiff and the fur fluffed out, forming spikes along its full length. Before the Iwa-nin could dodge, Naruto twisted and swung the tail as hard as possible.

The Iwa-nin was lucky; if his bloodline had not been active he would have lost his head there and then. As it was, he was knocked back with enough force to make him lose his balance and fall into the lightning web, which gave him enough of a shock to disrupt his chakra control and deactivate his kekkei genkai.

Naruto landed in a crouch on the Iwa-nin's chest as Hinata landed behind him, throwing a few shuriken to knock a swarm of flying kunai off course.

"In my opinion, knowing my father was the Yondaime Hokage is irrelevant to me," Naruto muttered as he raised one hand, a cone of wind chakra forming over his knuckles, "Hinata and I will defeat whoever Iwa sends to get revenge."

The Iwa-nin glared up at him, "A Tsuchi, a member of the strongest clan in Iwa, defeated by a mere child. How can I pass on and face my ancestors under such a burden of shame?"

"Tell them that you were defeated by the son of the Yellow Flash, the jinchūriki of the Kyūbi no Kitsune. They may understand." He drew back his chakra-coated fist, "Go now in peace, Tsuchi-san."

The man chuckled, "You are worthy of your father's name, boy." Naruto smiled behind his mask, then his hand plunged down.

The dark Kumo-nin cursed and cancelled the technique, allowing Naruto to retrieve his wakizashi. Hinata moved to cover his back, but was forced to dodge away as a crackling blast of electricity from the youngest Kumo-nin narrowly missed her.

The ninja with the whip tried to exploit the distraction; Hinata barely managed to avoid death by blocking with one of her tantō, which became entangled in the chain.

As Naruto caught hold of his wakizashi and turned, the whip was jerked back and Hinata's tantō blade snapped off just above the hilt.

Naruto shunshined to her side as she staggered, letting the now-useless handle fall to the ground, but was prevented from retaliating by a cry of, "Ranton: Fukanō Dasshutsu!" (Storm Release: Impossible Escape)

The duo split up as the attack streaked past, but were unpleasantly surprised as the attack _multiplied_ and hit them anyway, sending them flying in different directions.

**_"KITS!" _**Kyūbi yelled, **_"Stop yourselves rolling or you'll black out!"_**

Naruto stabbed Durandel into the ground, arresting his momentum enough to flip back onto his feet and shunshin to Hinata. His arms were cramping horribly and from what he could feel through the link Hinata's were completely numb.

**_"You were both careless," _**Kyūbi admonished, **_"You could have both died just now."_**

Naruto winced. His shirt now had several gashes in it; all of them charred black and smoking. Hinata was no less singed-looking, though thankfully her dignity was still preserved since Naruto had taken a bigger strike than her. Both sighed with relief as Naruto felt the cramps vanish and sensation returned to Hinata's arms.

_"I'll take the guy with the whip," _Naruto said, _"While he's there we can't fight the others properly." _Without waiting for a reply he went into a shunshin, leaving six words floating in his wake, "Fūton: Shinoni Kaiden." (Wind Release: Two Steps of Death)

Even if the whip-wielding Kumo-nin had known what was coming, he still would not have been able to stop it. Before he could even blink, a wind chakra-enhanced blade slashed upwards across his chest from his right hip to his left shoulder. Barely a second after that, another attack laid his back asunder and Naruto reappeared beside his partner, looking just as if he had never even moved.

Before the shinobi had even hit the ground, Naruto and Hinata were distracted by a loud crackling noise. When he saw the source, Naruto tilted his head slightly, "Huh. After we failed to retrieve it the first time, I wasn't expecting to see the Raijin no Ken ever again… Aoi Rokushō."

The missing-nin smirked, "You recognize me then?"

Naruto nodded, "I'm afraid so. But at least the only black mark on your ROOT mission records can be dealt with today."

Aoi scoffed, "You seem rather certain of my defeat."

Naruto raised his wakizashi, the subtle glow around the blades revealing that they were saturated with wind chakra, "Lightning beats Earth; Earth beats Water; Water beats Fire; Fire beats Wind and Wind beats Lightning. Given that I am a Wind-type and that sword is a Lightning-type…"

He sprang forwards and clashed blades with Aoi, who was shocked to feel the Raijin's blade give a little, "W-What…?"

Naruto nodded once, "My scissors beats your paper. Game over." The Raijin gave a little more, and then Naruto's blade cut straight through it and severed Aoi's neck. The Raijin deactivated as it fell from Aoi's hand and Naruto caught it, immediately sealing it away to be returned to Konoha's vaults after the mission.

A massive chakra surge drew his attention as he heard the Storm Release Kumo-nin roar, "RATON: TSUISEKI ARASHI!" (Storm Release: Tracking Storm)

-TR-

Yūgao, Sai, Yurihime and the two Kage Bunshin left by the absent duo turned as they heard a distant rumble of thunder and saw storm clouds gathering back the way they had come.

Yurihime immediately began complaining that she was going to get wet, but Yūgao shook her head, "Those are from a jutsu; they're not natural." This was reinforced a second later as the clouds began firing lightning bolts downwards.

Silently she prayed her two students were alright. If they were fighting in that, they would need all the help they could get.

-TR-

Naruto swore as he dodged another bolt of lightning. _"Is it my imagination," _he thought, _"or are they getting faster?"_

It wasn't his imagination it turned out, as he and Hinata were forced to evade about four bolts in five seconds.

**_"Try blowing the clouds away," _**suggested Kyūbi.

_"Don't talk unless you have a helpful solution!" _Naruto snapped back.

**_"This _****is _a solution, you moron!" _**Kyūbi snarled, **_"Are you a Wind-user or aren't you? Just use some of my chakra and blow those clouds away!"_**

Naruto sighed, delved into Kyūbi's chakra and drew up as much as he could. Flashing through seals while still running from an endless barrage of electrical attacks intent on frying him, he twisted and jumped, "Fūton: Daitoppa!"

The resultant blast was _nothing_ like Naruto was used to. Instead of the usual powerful gust which blew away anything in its path, what came from Naruto's hands could only be described as a concentrated hurricane, which blasted the storm clouds away in less than a second.

The Kumo-nin's hands flew into a new string of seals as he snarled, "Ranton: Jūden Ōkoku!" (Storm Release: Charged Kingdom)

The two Konoha ninja immediately noticed the effects of the technique; Naruto's tongue and mouth tasted like they had been plated in copper and his hair stood on end (meaning, more than usual). He looked to his right and saw that Hinata was experiencing the same phenomenon, though the halo of indigo surrounding her head looked far more amusing.

_"There's something wrong here," _Hinata remarked, _"There has to be more to this technique than just charging the air with static electricity."_

Naruto agreed and began drawing on his chakra, only to grunt with pain as electricity coursed over his body and shocked him.

A second later, Naruto heard a gasp of pain as Hinata discovered that she got shocked from channelling chakra too. Kyūbi's voice sounded in both their heads, **_"Stupid girl! If your partner is being shocked, why would you think you weren't going to be?"_**

_"I had to check," _Hinata replied.

Naruto cut off Kyūbi's retort, _"Kyūbi! Chew us out later! Right now I need you to analyze this technique and find a weakness for us to exploit, because at the moment all we have are kenjutsu and taijutsu against two people who can fry us into a fine crisp at close range! Hold on, how the hell'd he get tha- oh shit, INCOMING!"_

They leapt as one, only just avoiding the Ranton chakra-imbued chain whip as it hit the ground where they had been standing, blasting a large hole several feet across with a flash of light and a clap of thunder.

_"That thing's even more dangerous now!" _Naruto began cursing their foolishness, _"Why didn't we pick it up before? Kami above and Yami below, we're making every rookie mistake in the book on this mission!"_

Hinata was spared the trouble of responding by Kyūbi, who chose that moment to interrupt, **_"I've got it! His technique electrocutes you if you use chakra but it's limited by his ability to maintain it; you have to overload it!"_**

_"How?" _Hinata asked, _"He's an adult jōnin or higher, how can we overpower him?"_

Naruto ducked a crosswise attack. The Kumo-nin wasn't using the chain whip properly; he was just swinging it at them like a flail. Evidently he did not know how to use it properly.

As his container jumped over an attack aimed at his legs, Kyūbi continued, **_"The key is my yōki. No matter how big that guy's reserves are, they aren't even a drop in the ocean compared to my own. I'll give you the chakra and you form a chakra cloak. It should protect you from the static… in theory." _**The last two words were whispered.

_"What was that last bit?" _Naruto asked suspiciously.

**_"Nothing! Here's the chakra!"_**

Naruto's eyes narrowed, but he finally decided it wasn't worth the migraine and began wreathing his body in the chakra cloak as Kyūbi's chakra bubbled into his coils.

The two Kumo ninjas' eyebrows rose as Naruto straightened from his crouch, sparks skittering over the sheet of red-tinted chakra wrapped around his body, unable to reach skin and deliver their payload. _"A jinchūriki!" _the older missing-nin thought, _"No wonder he has those ears and the tail, not to mention the energy to have held out this long! This is less than good news for us!"_

Naruto growled, then flung his head back and unleashed a deafening howl. The chakra-enhanced sound wave instantly blew away the Ranton chakra filling the air and three both Kumo-nin backwards a short distance as bodies and tents were tossed around by the force of Naruto's roar. The only thing unaffected was Hinata, the bijuu chakra flowing through her coils protecting her, her hair whipping in the winds swirling around her but otherwise unfazed as she anchored herself to the ground with chakra.

Naruto settled into a crouch and slowly drew his wakizashi, having sheathed both of them during the technique with the lightning storm firing bolts at them so that he had a better freedom of movement. As the two Kumo-nin recovered and turned, Naruto sprang.

Both shinobi smirked and prepared to counter what seemed like a blind charge, the elder raising the whip in his right hand and the younger taking aim with both hands, each waiting until evasion was impossible to attack.

Just before that moment came however, their target simply vanished from sight. The Kumo chūnin swore, "Fuck! Where did he go?" His answer came not a second later and most certainly not in the fashion he'd been expecting; a spray of blood drenched his entire left side from head to toe as his only remaining ally fell to his knees, clutching the stump of his right arm while the limb itself lay in the sodden grass at his feet.

"It's a shame," intoned the blond shinobi's voice, startling the chūnin, "that you will not life to learn this lesson; Kumo shinobi you may be, wielder of a powerful bloodline you may be, and A-rank or higher you may have been ranked in the bingo book, but the only people who can win a battle of attrition against a jinchūriki are other jinchūriki, Kages and perhaps the most powerful of S-ranked shinobi. You fit none of those criteria, I'm afraid." His wakizashi flashed through the air and the Kumo-nin's head rolled.

Suddenly it was just Naruto and the Kumo chūnin eyeing each other and waiting for the first move to be made. The chūnin's eyes flicked to the whip on the floor, but before he could move to grab it Hinata beat him to it. She landed next to Naruto and immediately sealed it away.

The chūnin's eyebrows furrowed. "So what?" he spat, "I don't need that to kill you! My kinjutsu can do that by itself!" he fired twin streams of lightning at them, but they dodged. "Dodging won't save you!" he roared, b ringing both arms up over his head.

Naruto and Hinata charged, but were thrown back as a bolt struck in front of them. As they both staggered up again, they saw that storm clouds had rolled in and their opponent was looking triumphant, "Konoha fools! You can't possibly beat me now! Kinjutsu: Zen'nō Raijin no Chisei: Shinseina Hatsubai!" (Forbidden Technique: Reign of the Omnipotent Lightning God: Divine Release)

The clouds above them began to glow, becoming brighter and brighter until thousands of lightning bolts exploded out of them, converging on the laughing Kumo chūnin and enveloping him in a crackling sphere.

**_"Uh oh," _**Kyūbi muttered, **_"I know this technique."_**

_"You do?" _Hinata replied, _"What is it?"_

**_"It's called, as you heard, Reign of the Omnipotent Lightning God. The Rikudō Sennin created it, and only one person has wielded it since him; the Shodaime Raikage, though he had the wisdom to never use its most powerful ability as this little upstart has just done."_**

_"How powerful is it?" _Naruto asked curiously.

**_"You know how Kaminari no Kuni has all those mountains and valleys? Well let's just say that it didn't look anything like that until after the Jūbi fled its battle there with the Rikudō Sennin."_**

There was a pause, then Naruto said quietly, _"Are you… serious?"_

**_"Oh don't worry," _**Kyūbi said happily, **_"This kid, Divine Release or not, is still nowhere near the level of the Rikudō Sennin. _He _was able to wound the Jūbi multiple times, cause that much damage to the surrounding landscape and maintain that technique long enough that the Jūbi was eventually forced to flee due to its injuries and because it had used up so much of its chakra during the fight, and even then he still survived using the technique. This guy… I give him half an hour at most before he dies from the overload of power running through his body, and that's being generous."_**

_"So… what? Do we just stand and fight him until he dies then?" _Naruto asked.

He gasped as a stinging sensation ran through his head courtesy of the Kyūbi, **_"Absolutely not. This guy may be about as powerful as a kitten by comparison to the Rikudō Sennin, but he's still using this kinjutsu. No matter how much of my power you try to use, if you stand and try to fight him you _will_ die. Both of you."_**

_"So if we can't fight him," _said Hinata, _"What will we do?"_

**_"Your only available option is to run away. Run away and try to keep enough distance that he can't attack you."_**

_"Right." _The two ninja looked back at the sphere and were immediately forced to cover the eyeholes of their masks for fear of losing their enhanced sight as the sphere became blindingly bright and imploded.

What had once been the Kumo chūnin was no longer any such thing; the creature which straightened up and turned to look at them held a roughly humanoid shape but that was where the similarities ended.

It was comprised entirely of lightning so purely white it was tinted blue, with a large yellow light glowing in the centre of its chest and blood-red eyes slanted in an expression of terrible malevolence. Then it opened its mouth and laughed, and its voice cracked like thunder. In short, what stood before them may once have been a normal human, but that was no longer the case.

**"Hahahaha! What do you think now, Leaf dogs? I will destroy you both and you can do nothing to stop me!"**

Naruto and Hinata didn't reply; they just turned around and started running. **"Cowards!" **roared the Kumo-nin, immediately giving chase.

-TR-

Naruto and Hinata bounded from tree to tree with all the speed they could muster, _"Hinata, how far ahead are we?"_

Hinata activated her Byakugan, _"He's gaining on us!"_

**_"Use chakra cloaks, it might give you enough of a boost to keep ahead!" _**They each felt bijuu chakra flow into their coils and immediately formed their cloaks.

_"Incoming!" _Hinata called and the two ex-ROOT split up, the tree they had been about to land on exploding into splinters as their pursuer's attack missed them and detonated against the trunk. They were each pelted with fragments which caught fire and burned up on contact with their chakra cloaks.

**"Those freakish jinchūriki powers won't save you, pests!"**

**_"Maybe, maybe not;" _**Kyūbi snickered, **_"but time sure will, you arrogant little worm."_**

Naruto drew his wakizashi, drawing the fox's attention, **_"What ARE YOU DOING? You can't fight him!"_**

_"I'm not. We need to gain ground so I'm delaying him!" _Out loud he roared, "Fūton: Ni Kaze no Yaiba!" The resulting wind blades were so strong that the air visibly rippled. They cut through the trunks of four trees on either side and brought them crashing down on the Kumo chūnin as he passed beneath them.

**_"Quite ingenious, I must say," _**Kyūbi remarked as Naruto and Hinata took a second to pause on a branch and look back, **_"however I am unsure that it will hold him for…"_**

**"Raiton: Myaku!" **(Lightning Release: Pulse)

**_"…long. LEG IT!"_**

The two genin obeyed; even as the pile of fallen trees glowed and exploded, they turned and continued running.

It turned out that they were less lucky this time. A chunk of jagged wood about a foot in diameter flew towards the back of Naruto's head and Hinata failed to see it in time. The log ploughed right through Naruto's chakra cloak before the bijuu chakra could reduce it to ash and impacted, instantly knocking Naruto unconscious.

Hinata cast a brief glance back at the Kumo chūnin before creating a Kage Bunshin, helping it lift Naruto off the branch and carry him as they proceeded onwards.

-TR-

Several miles north, the two Kage Bunshin with Yūgao and Sai suddenly turned and looked back.

The cat-masked ANBU leading the group noticed, "Is something wrong?"

The Hinata-Bunshin turned to look at her, "The originals are in peril."

The Naruto-Bunshin nodded, "The boss has been incapacitated and Tenshi is alone. They seem to be being pursued by a Kumo-nin with a kinjutsu that allowed him to turn his body into lightning."

Yūgao turned to march back down the road, but the two clones stepped in her way, "There isn't any need to intervene. Apparently the ninja they're fighting's technique will kill him in thirty minutes and they've already been running for four. They'll get through."

Yūgao's tense body posture told them plainly that she wished to assist her genin, but finally she said, "Alright. But you are going to dictate the whole story to me from the moment they left us."

-TR-

_"Hinata? Put me down; I can walk."_

_"Naruto? How do you feel?"_

_"Like I got hit in the back of the head by a large lump of wood. I am steady, however."_

**_"No time for small talk," _**Kyūbi interrupted, **_"You have twenty-six more minutes, so keep moving. Having to carry you is slowing your little mate down so that pest is catching up, and even though I can't see him I can tell he's probably mightily pissed off right now."_**

Naruto slipped from the Hinatas' shoulders as the Kage Bunshin, her job done, dispelled. He paused a second to make sure he was stable and they set off once more.

A tree exploded off to their right as they zigzagged back and forth to avoid their pursuer's attacks, a trick that was evidently not lost on their enemy as he began swearing and yelling at them to stay still.

_"I hear water," _Naruto said, _"up ahead."_

Before Hinata could respond, they ran out of forest to tree-jump through. The pair of them landed hard on the grass and kept running, the thunderous sound of water getting louder and louder, until they both stopped on a rocky outcropping and looked down. Across the waterfall and frothing, churning water below it, they could see a huge statue holding a seal, and from what they could see they were standing on the head of one directly across from it.

**_"Oh, the irony," _**Kyūbi growled, **_"The Valley of the End, again. Kits, do me a favour? You're standing on Madara Uchiha's head. Please destroy it."_**

The two genin ignored him as Hinata activated her Byakugan. _"We can't get across from here," _she reported to Naruto, _"We could get down, but we're right by the waterfall and the rapids at its foot look far too fierce to try water walking on them." _She stiffened, _"Behind us!"_

The two of them whipped around as their enemy landed before them, chuckling, **"Nice chase, but I'm afraid that for you two this is the end of the line. Fitting isn't it? You both die within spitting distance of your own wretched country, unseen and unaided."**

Naruto and Hinata settled into attack stances but the Kumo-nin simply brought his hands together, blue-white lightning accumulating between his palms before he flung both arms wide. The ball of lightning expanded immediately, transforming into a narrow shaft about four feet in length.

As the creature that had once been a human being grasped the middle of the shaft, one end expanded into a huge spearhead while the other end bloomed into a crackling cloud of electricity. **"Raiton: Ransa Deru Reranpāgo."** (Lightning Release: Lance of Thunder and Lightning) Faster than either genin could react, he drew the lance back over his head and flung it at them like a javelin.

Time seemed to slow to a dead crawl as Naruto watched the attack fly towards them and strike Hinata high on the left side of her chest, sending her spinning backwards off the edge. He turned in mounting horror as Hinata seemed to hang in the air. He saw her reach out to him, heard her voice in his mind whisper, _"Na… Naruto-kun…"_

And then she was just… gone.

**(A/N: DON'T PANIC! Hinata isn't dead, so you can put away the torches, pitchforks and lynching rope RIGHT NOW. Right, a little announcement. This was originally intended to be a two-part chapter only, but it would appear that it will now be a three-parter at least. As such, this is where ROOT concludes until such a time as I can finish the third (and hopefully last) part of this chapter. Until then folks, this is Leonineus saying GOODNIGHT!)**

**(A/N: This is a message for all writers who read my stories. Some of you may be encountering a slight issue with the Document Uploader (I've asked around and some are just getting bold and italic removed while others are getting nothing odd at all), and I just discovered an easier way to remedy it than having to read through the entire document in the Document Uploader re-adding the spaces. Simply delete all the text in the Document Uploader File View, then copy and paste the text from the document itself. Spread the word people, hasn't done crap about it even though I've sent in six e-mails about this exact problem (and I'm sure others have as well), so we'll have to make do with this until then.)**


	5. Part 3: Fallen, Risen & Reunited

Team ROOT

Chapter Three, Part Three: Fallen, Risen and Reunited

**(A/N: Well, how flattered am I that you guys enjoy this fic. I have noticed the significant difference between reviews on Chapters 1 and 2 and the last two parts of Chapter 3… did I really lose that many of my readers during the six months it took me to write the chapter?)**

Naruto stared dumbly at the spot where he had last seen Hinata for a long second before he gave a cry of horror and took a running dive off the edge after her.

He saw a splash below and knew Hinata had landed in the water. He himself braced for impact.

-TR-

The Kumo chūnin looked over the edge coldly to see the blond Konoha genin disappear underwater. Sighing, he headed downstream to intercept.

-TR-

Naruto broke the surface of the water, _"__Kyūbi! __Can __you __find __Hinata?__"_

"_**She's ten feet to your left and fifteen straight down."**_

Naruto's eyes widened and he immediately began swimming down.

Hinata was floating close to the riverbed, two submerged boulders having caught her foot. Naruto swam down and wrapped an arm around her waist, using the other hand to free her foot before heading to the surface.

Once again, Naruto's head breached the churning water and he drew a deep breath, looking around and pulling Hinata closer towards him so that her head wouldn't go underwater again.

Naruto kicked, beginning his slow swim to the nearest bank. Reaching it, he pushed Hinata up onto the bank and climbed up after her.

Rolling Hinata onto her back, he checked her breathing and pressed his hands to her chest.

-TR-

The Kumo chūnin stopped on a ledge a little way down from the waterfall and looked into the water. A small motion caught his eye, and he grinned as he saw the two Konoha genin emerge onto the bank. Turning, he set off.

-TR-

Naruto was starting to panic; Hinata still wasn't showing any reaction to his attempts to revive her, _"__Kyūbi, __DO __SOMETHING!__"_

Kyūbi immediately noticed the little light Naruto had created in his mindscape had lit up, signifying that the seal had opened enough for more of his chakra to filter through. Focusing his chakra, he threw it towards the perceived "gap" in the seal and into his vessel's chakra coils.

Naruto's hands glowed with red chakra, the crimson energy sinking into Hinata's chest and communing with the store of bijuu chakra stored in her body from the marking. It spread, wrapping around Hinata's lungs and slowly shifting inside them. The water in her lungs, unseen by anybody except perhaps a Hyūga, turned red.

Kyūbi smirked as only a fox can, knowing what he could do now. He had heard of the Nidaime Hokage, the man with such a high level of control over his prodigious Suiton affinity that he could even manipulate individual water molecules, while he was sealed into his first and second jinchūriki. What he was doing now was imbuing the water in his vessel's mate's lungs with his chakra and thus allowing him to force it up and out of her body.

"_Kyūbi?__" _Naruto's voice echoed around him and he dropped the smug smirk. Plenty of time to be a genius later, right now his vessel needed assistance. He concentrated, and the water in Hinata's lungs shifted.

Hinata convulsed, her throat rippling ever-so-slightly before she suddenly sat bolt upright, rolled over and vomited. Water poured from between her lips, an endless stream that easily lasted half a minute before she finally coughed up a few more drops and rolled over again, right into Naruto's arms.

"_Thanks, Kyūbi."_

"_**No problem, but I reserve my divine right to be smug over you needing my aid until later."**_

"_You're an asshole, but fine. Wait a second…"_

Naruto raised his head and laid Hinata down on her back before standing and turning on the spot.

The Kumo chūnin appeared ten feet behind him and Naruto settled into a taijutsu stance.

"_**Kit, you still have ten to fifteen minutes left before that kinjutsu wears off. Just try to keep him at bay until then, if you can."**_

Naruto frowned, _"__Keep __him __at __bay? __Ugh. __At __the __risk __of __sounding __like __a __Nara, __this __is __going __to __be __troublesome.__"_

The Kumo chūnin grinned, **"****Well, ****nice ****to ****see ****that ****one ****of ****you ****has ****the ****good ****manners ****to ****die ****when ****a ****god ****tells ****them ****to****…" **He looked closer, noticing for the first time that Hinata was still alive and now looking at him through half-lidded eyes, **"****I ****take ****it ****back; ****you****'****re ****both ****still ****as ****ill-mannered ****as ****each ****other! ****How ****dare ****you ****flout ****a ****god?****"**

"You're not a god," Naruto replied, "You're just a cocky little upstart."

His enemy laughed, the sound enhanced with cracking thunder, **"****So ****you ****say, ****but ****the ****reality ****is ****that ****my ****kinjutsu ****has ****made ****me ****become ****a ****truly ****divine ****being, ****one ****t****hat ****will ****destroy ****you ****with ****not ****even ****a ****fragment ****of ****its ****power! ****Finally, ****the ****Namikaze ****and ****Uzumaki ****clans ****will ****pay ****for ****their ****hand ****in ****my ****father****'****s ****death ****with ****blood ****and ****tears! ****The ****Kazama ****will ****at ****last ****have ****proven ****their ****superiority ****and ****I, ****Hakai ****Kazama, ****will ****be ****the ****one ****to ****do ****it!****"**

Naruto frowned, "Sorry, but I don't recognize the name. Should I?"

"**You should; my father led the team that was sent by the Sandaime Raikage to kidnap Kushina Uzumaki back during the Third Shinobi World War! She was to be placed in our breeding program; her special chakra would have made Kumo all the stronger once the war was over! But no, your filthy Yondaime Hokage wouldn't let that happen! He just wouldn't give up; he chased them down without rest and slaughtered them! My father lived just long enough to deliver his final words to the BOLT team sent to rendezvous with them before he died!"**

"And what were these last words?" Naruto asked curtly.

"**Beware ****the ****Namikaze****… ****Beware ****the ****Yellow ****Flash****…" **growled Hakai Kazama, **"****They ****told ****me ****it ****was ****meant ****as ****a ****warning; ****my ****father ****serving ****our ****village ****to ****his ****dying ****breath ****by ****warning ****them ****not ****to ****engage ****Konoha ****directly, ****not ****with **_**him **_**at ****the ****helm! ****But ****I ****knew ****the ****truth****… ****my ****father ****wasn****'****t ****warning ****Kumo; ****it ****was ****his ****last ****wish ****to ****me! ****Destroy ****the ****clans ****who ****brought ****such ****shame ****upon ****ours!****"**

Naruto snorted, "Hate and anger… this is one of those times when I wish I'd listened to Danzō-jiji about emotions making people weak, but with Hinata at my side it didn't matter either way."

"**HA!****" **Hakai laughed mirthlessly, **"****You ****think ****you ****can ****stop ****me? ****Before ****I ****abandoned ****Kumo, ****I ****dealt ****with ****one ****last ****loose ****end! ****I ****tricked ****the ****BOLT ****who ****failed ****to ****save ****my ****father! ****I ****imprisoned ****them ****one ****by ****one, ****tortured ****them ****into ****insanity ****and ****killed ****them! ****It ****was ****pathetic ****how ****easy ****they ****were ****to ****capture ****and ****imprison, ****but ****that ****just ****made ****it ****all ****the ****more ****fun! ****The ****kunoichi ****on ****the ****squad ****lasted ****the ****longest; ****you ****wouldn****'****t ****believe ****how ****long ****she ****screamed ****and ****begged ****before ****she ****broke! ****After ****that ****of ****course ****she ****was ****no ****more ****use ****to ****me, ****so ****I ****killed ****her!****" **A smug smirk slid across the jagged red gash that passed for his mouth, **"****I ****wonder****… ****after ****I ****kill ****you ****I****'****ll ****of ****course ****have ****to ****take ****your ****little ****girlfriend ****into ****my ****care; ****how ****long ****do ****you ****think ****she ****will ****last? ****Hopefully ****a ****while, ****after ****all ****we ****can****'****t ****have ****fun ****if ****she ****refuses ****to ****play!****"**

Naruto's eyes narrowed to slits, _"__Kyūbi. __Chakra. __Now.__"_

"_**You got it."**_

Crimson chakra swirled around Naruto's body, wrapping around his tail like a sleeve as his whiskers thickened. His teeth lengthened and his eyes turned red, the pupils narrowing into slits. Finally, a tendril of red chakra unfurled from his tailbone and thickened, creating a translucent tail to join his physical one.

Naruto raised his head, the two tails whipping behind him, **"****Well ****done ****buddy****… ****you ****just ****succeeded ****in ****royally ****pissing ****me ****off.****"**

Hakai laughed, **"****The ****irony ****here ****is****… ****delicious. ****My ****father ****died ****right ****here, ****at ****the ****Valley ****of ****the ****End, ****because ****of ****a ****Namikaze ****and ****an ****Uzumaki. ****Now ****the ****heir ****to ****the ****Kazama ****will ****fight ****the ****heir ****to ****the ****Namikaze ****and ****Uzumaki ****and ****avenge ****his ****clan!****" **He brought up his hand and created his lance attack, then charged.

Naruto ducked under the swinging attack and brought up his leg, his shin glancing off the Kazama's side in a spray of sparks. He rolled aside as the lance changed direction and swung down at him before flipping over and throwing a punch at his opponent. A whirlwind of Fūton chakra exploded into being around his closed fist just before it made contact, but it still failed to penetrate and merely slid off the armour. Naruto kicked backwards out of the way just in time to avoid the lance as it almost cut him in half, his hands blurring before he brought both hands together in front of his chest and yelled, **"****Fūton: ****Sennoyūgen ****Tankende ****Shōmetsu!****"** (Wind Release: Annihilation by a Thousand Unseen Daggers)

He slowly drew his hands apart, a barely-visible cloud of Fūton chakra expanding between his palms until it was about the size of a watermelon. Naruto smirked, **"****Ichiji-shō: ****Hijōshikina ****Kakezan!****" **(Primary Phase: Insane Multiplication)

The cloud rippled and exploded, surrounding Naruto's body with a haze of wind chakra while he stood at the centre, protected by the chakra cloak covering him. He smirked, bringing up both hands and shifting them as a puppeteer of Sunagakure would, **"****Niji-shō: ****Dankai ****Jōryū****…" **(Secondary Phase: Stage Preparation)

Hakai attacked, wielding the lance like a bo staff as Naruto suddenly dodged, dashing from side to side to avoid the lance, and all the time the haze of wind chakra that had surrounded him sub divided, becoming countless smaller hazes as they gathered around eventually forming a huge sphere around the Kazama as he stopped and raised his lance in an attempt to break it.

Naruto appeared in front of him in a shunshin, his hands no longer lined with chakra threads as they moved to a tiger seal. The blond raised his eyes, a broad smirk breaking out across his face as he spoke, **"****Farewell, ****Hakai ****Kazama. ****You ****fought ****well****… ****but ****it ****appears ****that **_**I **_**am ****the ****better ****shinobi. ****Sanji-shō: ****Saishūhō.****" **(Tertiary Phase: The Final Act)

The cloud of Fūton chakra surrounding the Kumo chūnin glowed and began swirling faster and faster. Its trapped target began looking for an escape route, prompting Naruto to grin, **"****Don****'****t ****even ****try. ****This ****technique ****is ****inescapable; ****thousands ****of ****tiny ****blades ****of ****Fūton ****chakra ****will ****strike ****from ****every ****possible ****direction. ****If ****the ****crushing ****force ****of ****so ****many ****blades ****converging ****on ****the ****same ****spot ****at ****once ****does ****not ****kill ****you, ****being ****reduced ****to ****mist ****by ****their ****cutting ****power ****certainly ****will.****"**

He extended his hand as the whirling storm of chakra reached its maximum speed, turned it palm-up and clenched it shut, **"****Now****… ****goodbye.****"**

The cloud flared and immediately imploded, the concussion shaking the ground for miles around as Naruto dropped to his knees, having used up a fair amount of his chakra due to the taxing demands of that technique.

-TR-

The ground shuddered under Yūgao, Sai, Yurihime and the Naruto-Bunshin as they all turned. In the distance, a huge cloud of dust erupted from what Yūgao guessed to be the location of the Valley of the End. The cloud loomed higher and higher, until it appeared to strike the roof of the world and blossomed sideways. Within seconds, a mushroom-shaped grey pillar towered over the world like a vengeful Kami.

"Unbelievable…" murmured Yurihime, "What kind of ninja technique could cause that?"

Yūgao nodded, too stunned to agree.

-TR-

"WHAT THE HELL'S THAT THING?"

"IT'S THE KYŪBI! IT'S COMING TO FINISH WHAT IT STARTED!"

"WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE!"

Sarutobi sighed, "Morons. I'd quite like to know myself… but I'm fairly certain I know _exactly_who did it."

-TR-

"Was that… from Hi no Kuni?" stammered Ryōtenbin no Ōnoki, "What could have done that?"

From outside the window he heard screams.

"WHAT IS THAT THING?"

"IT'S THE YONDAIME HOKAGE! HE'S COMING BACK FROM THE DEAD TO FINISH WHAT HE STARTED!"

"WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE!"

Ōnoki didn't even bother saying anything; he just facepalmed.

-TR-

Orochimaru looked out of the entrance of the Akatsuki cave in which he and his partner Sasori stood, seeing the mushroom cloud in the distance, _"__What __power __is __this__… __I __must __acquire __it __for __myself!__"_

He suddenly noticed the roof was cracking slightly and spoke aloud, "Ah, Sasori we should leave. I think the roof is about to collapse… Sasori? Sasori?"

He looked around, before realizing that the boulder sealing the entrance of the cave was rolling back into position. Just before the opening completely closed, he saw Sasori walking off on the other side.

Sasori just about heard Orochimaru's muffled voice bellow, "SASORI YOU PUPPET-MAKING MOTHERFU-…" before there was a deafening crash and the roof of the cave collapsed. He didn't even look back.

It would be many hours yet before Orochimaru was able to crawl out of the rubble, the shreds of his Akatsuki cloak hanging off his frame. With a snort of disgust he tore them off, "This is ridiculous. I'm leaving Akatsuki; I'll set up my own force. I hear that weak fool in Ta no Kuni wants a ninja village; he shouldn't be hard to persuade."

With a hissing laugh he disappeared in a shunshin.

-TR-

"Whoa…" murmured Sabaku no Kankurō as he eyed the mushroom cloud in the distance, "I wonder what did that?"

His siblings didn't reply. Temari was obviously thinking the same thing. Gaara, on the other hand, was trying to work out why Shukaku was gibbering something about the Kyūbi having a man-period.

-TR-

"_**You alright there, dumbass?"**_

"_What'd I do now?"_

"_**Oh, I don't know… USED A JUTSU WHICH JUST WORE YOU OUT? IDIOT!"**_

Naruto sighed and severed the mental link between them, hardly interested in hearing his tenant's rant.

"**That****…" **a voice split the air and Naruto's head jerked up, **"…****was ****an ****impressive ****technique. ****BUT ****IT ****WASN****'****T ****ENOUGH!****"**

Naruto tried to rise, but what Kyūbi had said was true; he was now exhausted. Even as he tried to stand his enemy brought up his hand and charged at Naruto with the lightning lance held high.

The blond was only able to straighten up on his knees before the lance plunged into his chest and pierced his heart. Everything instantly went black.

-TR-

Hinata's eyes went wide as she saw her partner transfixed by the glowing shaft impaled through his chest, before she rolled over and screamed, "NO!"

-TR-

Yūgao's head snapped around as the Naruto-Bunshin gave a cry of pain and dispersed. "What happened?" she said. Neither of the others replied; it was obviously a rhetorical question.

-TR-

Hakai Kazama let the lance disperse, the blond's body tipping sideways to hit the ground. He stepped over him dismissively, moving towards Hinata.

-TR-

Kyūbi swore loudly. He knew that he didn't have the "permission" he needed to do this, but he didn't have the option. Mustering the other seven tails of his chakra that Naruto had not commandeered, he shoved them into the seal with as much force as he could. His gamble struck lucky; he was temporarily in control of Naruto's body. Kicking his healing factor on Naruto's body into as high a gear as it would go, he reached out with his chakra.

Before he could do anything however, the Shiki Fūjin kicked in. Kyūbi's chakra was wrenched back behind the seal, all except the two tails Naruto had already been using. Kyūbi swore again as his consciousness slammed back into his cell, even as the bars before him glowed and changed shape.

Where once had stood a line of iron bars now loomed a towering barred door. Deadbolts hung every six feet, chains lined the entire surface and padlocks kept them all locked into a meshed pattern.

"**DAMN ****YOU ****YONDAIME!****" **he roared at the barrier, smashing his tails against it time and time again with no visible result, **"****DAMN ****YOU ****AND ****YOUR ****ACCURSED ****PROPENSITY ****FOR ****OVERKILL!****"**

A hatch opened in the wall of chains and a small sign dropped out. Kyūbi's sharp eyesight had no problem with seeing what it said.

_You're the Kyūbi. Overkill is underrated._

Kyūbi was dead silent for a full second before he growled, **"****I ****hate ****you.****"**

-TR-

Despite the rapid interruption of his attempt to assist, Kyūbi had succeeded. The amped-to-eleven-and-beyond healing factor instantly regenerated Naruto's destroyed heart, but as the seal had completely locked down the two tails' worth of bijuu chakra in Naruto's system could not return to their original owner. Instead, they did the only thing they could; they assimilated into his chakra coils directly. The healing factor reacted; Naruto's body convulsed. His muscles rippled, expanding ever so slightly; his hair lengthened to reach his shoulders and his bones lengthened. His fingernails became sharper and a pattern of calluses began forming on each palm.

Hakai Kazama turned around as the blond rolled over, **"****You****'****re ****very ****stubborn. ****I ****thought ****I****'****d ****just ****killed ****you.****"**

Naruto pushed himself onto his hands and knees before rising to his feet, _"__Strange__… __I __thought __I __was __dead. __So __how__… __no, __never__mind. __Hinata __is __in __danger.__"_

He raised his eyes and smirked at Hakai, "So sorry. But I'm not going to die just yet." He charged.

Hakai didn't have time to create a new lance attack, so he simply raised both arms and blocked before Naruto's fist powered into his defence like a twenty-ton anvil and shunted him backwards.

His eyes going wide, Hakai launched into an attack, swinging his own fist at the blond in return. Naruto dodged and then they were upon each other, Naruto's punches and kicks being blocked, dodged or parried and Hakai's attacks just being dodged.

Hakai snarled angrily and threw out a high kick. Naruto couldn't duck, he was already crouched too low; instead he brought up his right arm to block, a critical mistake. The second the kick hit his arm, Naruto felt his elbow shatter.

Naruto dropped to one knee, his arm hanging limply at his side as Hakai snorted and shoved him backwards. Naruto went sprawling, gritting his teeth as he landed on his broken arm but unable to stifle a muffled groan of pain. _"__Kyūbi, __where __the __hell __are __you?__"_

"**So ****this ****is ****how ****it ****ends,****" **murmured Hakai, a lance attack forming in his hand as he stood over Naruto, **"****You ****lying ****on ****your ****back ****like ****the ****Konoha ****dog ****you ****are ****while ****your ****bitch ****watches, ****helpless ****to ****do ****anything. ****Looks ****like ****the ****Kyūbi ****didn****'****t ****help ****you ****at ****all, **_**boy**_**! ****Once ****you ****die ****it ****will ****be ****released, ****then ****I ****will ****subdue ****it ****and ****take ****it ****back ****to ****Kumo! ****They ****will ****reward ****me ****beyond ****my ****wildest ****dreams ****for ****bringing ****them ****such ****power, ****and ****Kumogakure ****no ****Sato ****will ****throw ****down ****the ****other ****hidden ****villages ****and ****rule ****supreme! ****The ****Elemental ****Nations ****will ****be ****an ****empire, ****and ****I ****WILL ****BE ****ITS ****EMPEROR!****"**

Naruto spat at his feet and smirked, "I don't think so. You're already out of time."

Hinata was confused for a second, but then her eyes widened as she realized what he meant. Raising her eyes, she watched attentively.

"**I'm out of time? _I_'m out of time? Who's the one lying at my feet and about to die, huh? Who? It's you! YOU! YOU'RE GOING TO DIE HERE, UZUMAKI-NAMIKAZE, YOU AND YOUR LITTLE WHORE! NOW JUST SHUT UP AND _DIE_!"**

He reared backwards with the lance to throw it, and the technique… simply fizzled out in his hand.

"**W-What? ****What ****happened?****" **He stared as the last sparks faded away.

Naruto couldn't help it; he started laughing. It hurt; the tremors sent pain through his broken arm but he couldn't help it; he laughed and laughed, "You _honestly_ thought you were capable of wielding that power with no side-effects? Seriously?"

The Kazama was silent for a second, and then killing intent erupted as he jabbed a hand at Naruto, the lightning sheathing his body receding up his limbs even as he glared at Naruto, **"****WHAT ****IS ****IT? ****WHAT ****MAKES ****YOU ****THINK ****YOU ****HAVE ****THE ****RIGHT ****TO ****MOCK **_**ME**_**, ****HAKAI ****KAZAMA? ****FOR ****THAT ****MATTER, ****WHY ****ARE ****YOU ****STILL ****FIGHTING? ****I ****BROKE ****YOUR ****ARM, ****KILLED ****YOU, ****THREW ****YOUR ****WHORE ****OFF ****A ****CLIFF ****AND ****ALMOST ****DRO**WNED HER AND YOU STILL DEFY ME? IS IT BECAUSE OF YOUR PARTNER? THIS RIDICULOUS BELIEF OF KONOHA'S THAT TEAMWORK AND FIGHTING TO PRESERVE WHAT YOU HOLD DEAREST CAN CONQUER ALL? WHY DON'T YOU JUST GIVE UP AND _DIE_?" His armour vanished completely halfway through his rant, leaving him standing there as he had appeared before using the technique.

Naruto gave a mirthless laugh as he pushed himself upright and approached Hakai, grabbing him by the neck and lifting him clear off the ground, "You summed it up perfectly except for one thing. Well, two things. First, my partner is not a whore. And second, she's so much more than my partner. She's my soul mate; my greatest friend, closest confidant and most trusted ally. Without her I could not be who I am. She is mine, I am hers, and that is how it will stay until the day we both die."

"So it's love?" jeered Hakai, though his voice was raspy thanks to Naruto's grip on his neck, "Pathetic! You're basing your power on something as worthless as _love_? It's just an emotion! Emotions make you _weak_!"

"Emotions are our wings," Naruto said in a perfect monotone, "They allow us to fly, to achieve heights thought out of reach. Love is trust, and she and I have a bond of trust. We watch each other's backs and we have no-one we'd trust to do it better. We fight together for the same reason."

"You didn't fight me together! You ran like cowards! But what did I expect from Konoha shinobi?"

"We ran… for exactly the reason I just told you. We both had something to lose by standing and fighting, but when she-…"

"ENOUGH! Enough of your prattle! You speak of all this garbage but did not answer my question; WHY DID YOU FIGHT AND KEEP FIGHTING? Was it your duty as a Konoha ninja? Or as a Namikaze and Uzumaki? ANSWER ME!"

Naruto's expression had become cold, "Your question has been answered twice, maybe even three times already. As for my _duty_… I didn't fight you for my duty. I fought you because you dared to harm and almost kill the person I treasure more than any other. For such an action, such a grave mistake; the punishment can only be death."

Hakai opened his mouth to speak, but before he could he collapsed to dust. A large yellow gemstone engraved with the five kanji comprising the words "Shinseina Hatsubai" (Divine Release) landed on the floor and rolled for a few seconds before coming to a halt. The wind blew, and all that was left to show Hakai Kazama had ever existed was swept away on the breeze.

The seal apparently detected that the battle was over and reopened, allowing the bijuu chakra still circulating through Naruto's system to drain behind it again. He instantly sagged, but was able to pick up the jewel and limp over to Hinata where she sat against a rock. She smiled as he dropped down beside her, a haze of red chakra enveloping his right arm as Kyūbi got down to healing it.

"What is it?" Hinata murmured, examining the jewel with her Byakugan.

"I don't know. Judging by the kanji on the front I'd say it's what gave him that kinjutsu, but I've never heard of a kinjutsu contained in a gemstone before…"

"Nor me. We'll take it home and have it analyzed."

Naruto nodded, then shifted and laid his head on Hinata's legs. Within a few seconds he was asleep.

Hinata smiled as she brushed his bangs out of his face, before deciding to just rest her own eyes for a few minutes. She fell asleep almost as soon as she closed her eyes, her hand holding the jewel falling to rest limply beside her tail.

-TR-

Only a few minutes later, a figure entered the clearing. She wore the standard gear of a Kumo BOLT with a mask designed to look like a demonic cat with red eyes and stylized flames surrounding the edge and painted in blue and black. A long ash-blonde ponytail hung down her back, wrapped in bandages to keep it from coming loose and getting in her face.

She leapt out of the trees and landed on all fours in the grass with barely a rustle, looking about. Her eyes alighted on the two still figures and she moved in closer.

One was a girl who looked about a year older than herself. Her hair was long and deep blue, framing her pretty face and falling over her chest which, Yugito noted with a twinge of jealousy, was somewhat larger than her own. Her clothing was ripped and torn yet she was still completely decent. She had obviously been in a fight recently, but escaped from it relatively unscathed.

Yugito Nii's eyes scanned the girl once more and her mouth dropped open as she noticed for the first time what she had missed on her initial look; this girl had a pair of _fox __ears_ poking through her hair. Not only that, but a long and lustrous-looking tail rested on the ground beside her left hand.

Yugito suddenly noticed an odd feeling in her gut, but she couldn't identify it. A brief moment of introspection seemed to throw her a bone; she could suddenly feel a primal ache somewhere deep inside, a base yearning to submit, and it all centred on this girl.

She stepped backwards. Whatever this longing was, it was unfamiliar and unknown to her and that made her feel afraid. She made to turn away, but her eyes fell on the other stranger, the boy, deep in slumber with his head resting in the girl's lap, his own black-tipped orange ears and tail limp and relaxed. The ache struck again, struck with force enough to drive Yugito to her knees.

Yugito panicked, scrambling backwards away from the two ninja sleeping peacefully before her, desperate to escape-

"_Wait… what was that?"_

A yellow sparkle, unremarkable given the blazing sunshine above and yet incongruous… out of place… _familiar_, plucking at long-forgotten loose threads in the tapestry of her memory…

Prior panic now overcome by kittenish curiosity, Yugito crept on hands and knees towards the sleeping girl's left hand where it rested on the ground beside her tail, the Kumogakure kunoichi's guess at the sparkle's origin proven accurate as she saw a glitter between the slack fingers…

With the utmost care, Yugito lifted the limp hand and retrieved what lay beneath, bringing it up for a look at eye-level. As soon as Yugito's sharp eyes found the five kanji etched into the gemstone's golden facets, her brain simply stopped; her heart skipped half a dozen beats and her throat seized up painfully. She drew a sharp breath, then another, her breathing becoming more and more rapid until her brain remembered its job and started back up. A wash of memory clashed against barriers long since built to preserve her own sanity, flung them down in sundered ruin and cascaded into her mind. Helpless to resist, Yugito found herself swept through time and space, back to the day her world was irrevocably thrown into chaos.

_Flashback Begin!_

"_Kaa-san! Kaa-san!"_

_A six-year-old Yugito ran down the garden path, excitedly brandishing the chocolate bar the nice old lady down the street had given her for raking leaves in her garden, "Kaa-san! Come see what I got!"_

_She dashed through the front door (failing to notice a slight tingling sensation over her entire body as she crossed the threshold), scampered down the hall and turned into the living room, "Kaa-san! Kaa… kaa-san?"_

_Her mother Mijime Nii lay in the middle of the destroyed living room, bleeding from several open wounds and panting for breath. Over her stood Yugito's half-brother Hakai, fourteen years old and already a chūnin._

_He was smiling at her… but it wasn't the cheerful, friendly "I'm-your-big-brother-and-I'll-always-be-there-for-you" smile he always used when looking at her. It was cold and cruel, and Yugito felt her heard beat a little faster as she gazed into his eyes, once warm and caring but now alight with a kind of perverse insanity._

"_N-Nii-san?"_

"_Oh yes," he said in a horrible, mocking voice, "I'm just your beloved nii-san, just as you're my dearest nee-chan!"_

"_Yugito…" whispered Mijime from the floor, "Run…"_

_Lightning sprang from Hakai's fingertips, making the woman thrash and scream as she was electrocuted, before the onslaught stopped and she collapsed back onto the floor sobbing for breath._

"_That's enough of that," said Hakai, sitting down on the slashed up sofa, "Now; let's have a little chat, shall we? Just me, little nee-chan and our whore of a mother!"_

"_Why, nii-san?" Yugito's whisper was barely audible from where she still stood beside the door._

"_Why?" Hakai snorted, pointing at their mother on the floor, "Why what? Why is she a whore? Simple; she re-married and had another child, a daughter no less, and she'll undoubtedly grow up to be as much of a whore as her mother!"_

"_Why should I have dwelled on the past?" whispered Mijime, "No good comes of it, Hakai…"_

"_You spat on my father's memory!" Hakai roared, leaping up and kicking the woman in the side. There was a crack and she coughed up some blood._

"_Your father died serving his village to his last breath, Hakai…" she wheezed through bloody lips, "As did Yugito's… He'd have wanted me to move on… and he'd be horrified by what you've become."_

"_SHUT UP!" Hakai bellowed, bringing up his foot to kick her again, but her hand caught his foot on its way back down. Before he could react she leaned up and spat into his face._

_Hakai lost all semblance of self-control as the glob of bloody sputum hit him in the eye, grabbing her wrist and breaking it with a single brutal yank, he brought up his other hand and sheathed it in Raiton chakra before plunging it into Mijime's chest._

_The sheer rage-empowered brutality of the attack literally blasted the woman's body apart. Everything in the room was suddenly dyed dark red from floor to ceiling._

_Yugito __shakily __raised __her __hands __and __gazed __at __the __sanguine __ichor __that __coated __them. __She __opened __her __mouth __to __scream, __but __Hakai__'__s __voice __distracted __her,__ "__Oh __dear. __Sorry, _dear _nee-chan__… __but __it __appears __you__'__ve __seen __too __much.__" __He __charged, __bringing __up __his __hand __as __more __Raiton __chakra __accumulated __around __it._

_Yugito __threw __up __her __arms __in __a __pointless __attempt __to __defend __herself, __but __at __that __moment __she __heard __a __female __voice __in __her __mind __scream, _**"****NO!****" **_Blue __and b__lack __chakra __exploded __into __the __area __around __Yugito__'__s __body __just __before __the __blow __struck._

_The bijuu chakra enveloping the six-year-old saved her from the Raiton chakra, but the force of the bare-handed punch still threw her into the ceiling, which cracked from the impact._

_Yugito hung there, limp and barely semi-conscious from the blow to the back of her head, as Hakai glared up at her, "Stupid little whore, why won't you die?" He shrugged, "No matter, not even the cat bint can save you from this! Raiton: Myaku!"_

_The house detonated. In less than a second it was reduced to splinters and nothing larger than that as the concentrated pulse of Raiton chakra caused the walls and roof of the house to disintegrate. Yugito was flung high into the air, rising higher and higher over the village by the second, until gravity finally reasserted itself and she began to fall._

_The chakra cloak surrounding her body guttered out and Yugito did the only thing she could as the ground approached alarmingly fast; she screamed._

_BOLT were converging on the scene of the explosion, leaping from roof to roof. Three in particular had just landed on a roof when they heard a scream above them and turned to see a small body falling out of the sky. They paused briefly and then sprang into action, heading in the other direction._

_Yugito was still screaming, still flapping her arms in a desperate attempt to arrest her plunge to almost certain death. Finally she simply closed her eyes, not wishing to see the ground rushing up to greet her, to claim her small body when she hit it._

"_Oof!" Yugito landed heavily on something and opened her eyes to find herself looking at the masked face of a BOLT from where she lay in his arms, "That was close. Ten more feet and you'd be dead, little girl."_

_Yugito nodded dumbly as the BOLT touched down on a rooftop, "So what happened?"_

_Yugito blinked and then gasped, "Nii-san! He killed kaa-san and tried to kill me!"_

_The BOLT nodded as his two comrades landed beside him and turned to them, "You go tell the BOLT teams we're looking for this girl's brother; he did this. You, go inform the Raikage that I've taken the survivor to the hospital to be treated for shock."_

_The pair nodded and set off in different directions. The BOLT carrying Yugito set off as well, moving at a steady clip towards the main hospital. Looking down at the girl in his arms and seeing that she was shivering, he muttered, "You're very lucky, kid. If your father hadn't done what he did… you wouldn't even be alive now."_

_Yugito did not hear him; her brain had finally reached the conclusion that it was unable to process what it had just seen and shut itself down. The six-year-old's face immediately fell against the BOLT's chest as she passed out._

_Flashback End!_

Yugito jerked back, breathing hard as the emotions she had experienced that terrible day thudded through her chest. She shifted her position, intending to get up and leave, but before she could do so another memory drifted to the forefront of her mind.

Once again, Yugito found herself trapped in another memory she didn't want to recall…

…another experience that ruined her childhood forever…

…another _nightmare_.

-TR-

**Explanations**

**Kyūbi, Naruto, Hinata and the Shiki Fūjin:**

About a year before their departure from ROOT, Naruto and Hinata made an attempt to garner more control over the Kyūbi's chakra. They made contact with him and eventually discovered that the seal would allow more chakra through in three different circumstances:

Naruto makes a short- or long-term deal with Kyūbi, basically Naruto garners more control over the Kyūbi's chakra in return for giving the Kyūbi something.

Naruto asks for the chakra, which is what they usually do to make their chakra cloaks.

The situation desperately requires that large quantities of Kyūbi's chakra be brought into play and Naruto is not in a position to give direct permission e.g. badly wounded and/or unconscious.

They are restricted from drawing out amounts that might prove harmful to them in all three conditions however; if that happens the seal will immediately lock down.

Kyūbi is also capable of controlling his chakra even when it is not connected to the rest of him, such as the reserve in Hinata's body is. This is how the basis of their mental link works; Kyūbi manipulates the chakra in Hinata's body to access her senses (via the "contract" between him and them; access to their senses in return for more access to his chakra) and the information they give. He then sends this information back to himself and sends it on to Naruto.

The process can work in reverse, and since its inception it has become developed enough that Kyūbi is now capable of transmitting their thoughts in their actual voices, so that they don't have to listen to him speaking all the time.

**Levels of Power and how they relate to Tails:**

As for how the number of tails relates to power level, think of it like this; one tail represents a "level", such as in an RPG. Naruto and Hinata, when they marked one another, each went from full human (or "Level Zero") to being one-tailed hanyō (or "Level One"). After the fight with Hakai, Naruto has experienced an increase in his power and is now a two-tailed hanyō (and gone up to "Level Two").

The chakra cloak is like a temporary increase in level, but the tails are like a permanent level up.

**(A/N: I hope you enjoyed this, people. I feel I should point this out; the chapter is going to go further than three parts. MUCH further. My best estimate… about six parts. Hopefully less. Next chapter will be the second flashback for Yugito and the revelation of why she had those odd feelings around Naruto and Hinata! The physical indicator of Naruto's becoming a two-tailed hanyō will also present itself! Therefore until next time folks! Leonineus, OUT!**

***siiiiiiiiigh* And now to get on with coursework due in next week… Wish me luck.)**


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